Jaitley on AP: Only Sympathy No announcements

With TDP threatening to quit the NDA government, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley stepped in to pacify the sulking partner but did not offer anything new to the state. All that he said was that Centre was committed to giving Andhra Pradesh financial assistance equivalent to a special category status. Jaitley said he agreed with the assessment that Andhra Pradesh was financially suffering after Telengana was carved out of the state and his government will honour each and every commitment made by the Centre at the time of bifurcation.

On Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu's demand for fulfilling the promise of giving the state a special status, he said such a category did exist when the state was bifurcated in 2014. But after the implementation of the 14th Finance Commission recommendation, such a treatment is now constitutionally restricted to just the North Eastern and three hilly states. He did not make any comment on issues like special railway zone for Visakhapatnam and in fact blamed the state for not forming a special purpose vehicle to get funds under special package.

Andhra Pradesh government is yet to come back on the modalities of such transfer. He said all the institutions promised to Andhra Pradesh at the time of bifurcation are in the process of being set up. Asked about Congress President Rahul Gandhi's promise to give the state the special category status if his party is voted to power, Jaitley said, "I still have to follow constitutional award" of the 14th Finance Commission. "We are committed to giving monetary equivalent to special status to Andhra Pradesh," he said. On meeting revenue deficit of the state, he said, the Centre has already paid Rs 4,000 crore and only Rs 138 crore remain.