Chittoor DRC meeting to take note of Covid scenario

Tirupati: After a gap of almost 21 months, the Development Review Committee (DRC) meeting will be held on Tuesday to review the status of ongoing activities in various departments. It was last held on November 28, 2019 and due to Covid, DRC has never met again in 2020. Though scheduled to be held in March 2021, it was again postponed at the last minute.

District in-charge minister M Gowtham Reddy will chair the meeting as the chairman of DRC to be held at SV University senate hall. Normally, DRC meetings witness heated arguments between ruling and opposition party members which could not be seen now as all three MPs and 13 MLAs belong to ruling YSRCP.

The only TDP MLA N Chandrababu Naidu is not going to attend the meeting anyway. Last time, three TDP MLCs – G Srinivasulu, BN Rajasimhulu and G Saraswathi were there and those term ended earlier this year. PDF MLC Y Srinivasulu Reddy is expected to attend the meeting.

The meeting will take a critical note of the activities in each and every department since the time of the last meeting held. According to official sources, the prevailing Covid situation will figure prominently at the meeting.

The district continues to record around 200 Covid cases daily even now as against cases in single digits in some other districts. It could not find any respite from the Covid deaths while other districts have been recording zero deaths.

The meeting may take stock of the situation and it has to be seen whether any concrete decisions will be taken in this regard. The ongoing Nadu-Nedu works in schools and hospitals may become another major development for discussion.

During the first phase, the district reached 98.74 per cent of the target of Nadu-Nedu works in 1,533 schools at an estimated cost of Rs.369 crore. The second phase works have been taken up in one-third of the schools now.

Similarly, while the works under Nadu-Nedu were going on at some PHCs, the ambitious plans of developing Ruia hospital are still to be kick started. The pending Handri-Neeva canal works, achievements in agriculture and horticulture along with other departments will also be taken up.

Issues in village/ward secretariats and the ongoing welfare schemes may also find a place. Three MPs Dr M Gurumoorthy, N Reddeppa and P Mithun Reddy, Deputy CM K Narayana Swamy, Panchayat Raj Minister P Ramachandra Reddy, Collector M Hari Narayanan, MLAs, and district level officials are going to attend the meeting.