India will not go for fresh loans, says Union Minister

By Our Special Correspondent

HYDERABAD, JUNE 2. The Union Minister for Rural Development Minister, Mr. M. Venkaiah Naidu, has ruled out the Government exercising the option of further external borrowing, unless required for a very essential purpose.

The Minister told a meeting of MPs on ``Rural Industrialisation, Employment Generation and Poverty Alleviation--Policies and Issues,'' at the National Institute of Rural Development at Rajendranagar near here on Saturday that the loans taken by the Government had so far totalled Rs 12 lakh crores tagged onto a yearly interest burden of Rs 1.12 lakh crores.

Under the circumstances, the best way to end poverty in the rural areas was to encourage self-employment through various existing schemes, including DWCRA which was clubbed with five other such schemes under Swarna Jayanti Grama Rozgar Yojana. He expressed himself against creating more white collar jobs in the Government.

Mr Naidu also opposed the Government spoon-feeding public sector undertakings any more and felt the country would have been different if what was spent on them so far had been diverted to rural development. The Government faced financial crunch today while rural development required huge sums -- Rs. 66,000 crores for providing all villages in the country with road-connectivity and Rs. 40,000 crores to ensure protected water. However, efforts were under way to ensure rural development and this year, the rural credit target was increased to Rs 64,000 crores from Rs 40,000 crores earlier. The availability out of his Ministry was Rs 18,000 crores, including the funds promised by NABARD.

The Rural Development Minister stressed the importance of improving basic facilities in villages such as roads, drinking water, electricity supply, sanitation and healthcare so that investors would come forward to set up industries in or around them. He said more help could be extended to rural artisans engaged in self-employment ventures, pointing out that the recovery rate from them was as high as 99 per cent.

Mr Venkaiah Naidu announced that NABARD had agreed to set up 12 lakh tonnes of cold storage godown space this year by lowering interest rate on the loans given for the purpose from 10.5 per cent to 8.5 per cent. He wanted the State Governments to encourage artisans like weavers and blacksmiths by taking up schemes. He asked them to emulate Gujarat which was already using only khadi cloth for all its Government guesthouses, and Tamil Nadu which had just taken a decision to move in this direction.

The Union Minister for Information Technology and Parliamentary Affairs, Mr. Pramod Mahajan, who inaugurated the meeting, appealed to people not to misunderstand the computer as a tool used by ``a few English-speaking rich'' and asked them to opt for IT to develop themselves. He said, plans were drawn up to equip all the 6 lakh villages in the country with ``the capacity'' to have phones. He thanked the MPs for attending the meeting because most of them, under the normal circumstances, would not give serious thought to such a drab subject as rural development.

Mr Mahajan tried to dispel the popular belief that nothing had been achieved after the British left the country, citing roads laid, drinking water provided and infrastructure created. The country was not going forward at the speed required by the circumstances because of population explosion. Owing to ``unfortunate experiences during the Emergency,'' the issue of population was not being tackled in right earnest. If this problem was not tackled, the country's population would touch 150 crore by 2046 AD.

Mr R. C. Choudhury, Director-General, NIRD, welcomed the gathering while Mr Mathew C. Kunnumkal, Deputy Director-General, proposed a vote of thanks.

The MPs will stay on the NIRD campus for two more days discussing issues at workshops and sessions.

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Section  : Southern States
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