Recession blues hit Gajwel hard

Hyderabad: Recession blues took its toll on Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao's Assembly constituency Gajwel. The government has made zero allocations in this budget for the Gajwel Area Development Authority (GADA) which was created five years ago to promote the area as a model Assembly segment in the state.

The GADA was created soon after KCR assumed office in June 2014 and the Medak Collector headed the Authority. A Special Officer in the rank of Group I officer was appointed to execute the works sanctioned by the government to the Authority.

The duties of the authority includes planning for overall development of the area and convergence of government programmes, undertaking basic infrastructure works/ schemes such as, CC roads, CC drains, water supply schemes, electrification and streetlighting, undertaking innovative livelihood programmes for enhancement of productivity and training for employment generation activities linked to skill upgradation.

Nearly Rs 2,000-crore worth works were taken up for the development of Gajwel constituency in the last five years. For the first time, no specific allocations were made to the Authority for the development of road network and other infrastructure facilities in the budget proposals.

In the previous budgets between 2014 and 2018, the government had allocated not less than Rs 300 crore for GADA every year. Additional funds were also being made available under the Special Development Fund (SDF) for this Assembly segment.

For instance, Roads & Buildings department alone had spent Rs 15 crore for road development in 2017 and Rs 80 crore in 2018 -19. In the current financial year, no specific allocations were made in the budget proposals. R&B officials maintained that the total allocations for the development of road network has been reduced drastically this year.

The proposed allocation this year was Rs 1,400 crore as against Rs 5,500 crore allocated for Transport and R&B in the previous budget. The impact of economic recession was the main reason for downsizing the allocations to the developmental programme under capital expenditure, sources said.