AP gets fair deal, T just a varsity

• Only horticultural university announced for T
• Industrial clusters, two varsities, 1 IIT for AP
• Smart city in Krishnapatnam in Nellore district
• Kakinada to be a hub for hardware manufacturing

Hyderabad/New Delhi: The Andhra Pradesh state is happy that the NDA government has given a fair deal to it, while Telangana is peeved that its interests are neglected.

However, even as AP Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu went on record that it was a visionary budget, his Finance Minister Y Ramakrishnudu feels that the allocation to bridge revenue gap was meager. For its part, the Telangana government feels that the Centre has done great injustice to it. It feels that the budget has left Telangana people “uncertain and insecure.”

Andhra Pradesh secured promises of infrastructure development, but Telangana has to be content with a horticultural university.

Andhra Pradesh’s coast line – the second longest in the country after Gujarat – seems to have worked in its favour, receiving special attention from the government in terms of infrastructure development. The Union Finance Minister said that the government would complete its perspective plan for the Vizag-Chennai corridor, which, along with Bengaluru-Mumbai Economic Corridor, can potentially house 20 new industrial clusters.

The Central government has also identified the region around Kakinada town in East Godavari district as a hub for hardware manufacturing. Kakinada, Jaitley said, will be developed as “a key driver of economic growth in the region with a special focus on hardware manufacturing.” He also promised a smart city in Krishnapatnam in Nellore district as part of the Chennai-Bengaluru industrial corridor region.

Jaitley in his budget speech said, “Andhra Pradesh has been reeling under the loss of Hyderabad, which was developed as the economic growth engine of the erstwhile state. The new Andhra Pradesh government has an uphill task of building a capital for the new state, apart from developing infrastructure across 13 districts to woo investors.

Telangana, on the other hand, is trying to resurrect Hyderabad’s image as an investment destination even as it grapples with developing the backward districts in the state. Andhra Pradesh has opened its account with a revenue deficit of over Rs 15,000 crore, as compared with a surplus in Telangana.

Andhra Pradesh is among the four places in the country where a medical institute on the lines of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) will be established. Jaitley has allocated Rs 500 crore for the four proposed AIIMS institutions across the country.

Andhra Pradesh also got an Indian Institute of Technology (IIT). The Centre proposes to set up a National Academy for Customs and Excise in Hindupur in the backward Rayalaseema region. An agricultural university for new Andhra Pradesh and a horticulture university for Telangana have also been proposed in the budget, with a sum of Rs 200 crore.

But there is no mention of the Special Category State status for Andhra Pradesh or other assurances built into the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014. There is no particular mention of Polavaram project as well.

TRS feels that though the NDA government used the term ‘cooperative federalism,’ the same is nowhere to be seen in the budget.