India’s youngest state Telangana, with new schemes, new initiatives, innovations and a successful record, is emerging as the country’s strongest state, said Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan.
Addressing the 72nd Republic Day parade on Tuesday, she said by implementing a plethora of innovative, unique and people-oriented schemes and programs within a short span of time has carved a niche for itself in the history of the country.
The Governor noted that since the responsibility of governing the state was entrusted to Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, who happened to lead the movement for separate statehood for Telangana, it stood first and unique in the country in several sectors due to the planned and systematic efforts, during the past six-and-a-half years and has been providing inspiration to other states to emulate Telangana.
For the second consecutive year, the Republic Day ceremony was held at Public Gardens. Chief Minister Rao, his Cabinet colleagues and senior officials attended the event.
The Governor claimed that the state government with full dedication, determination and commitment has successfully been able to reconstruct and rebuild the state. Telangana has achieved great success in several sectors and has been attracting the attention of the entire country and became a role model.
“Strong foundations are being laid for a Bangaru Telangana, where there is no hunger, no suicides, and where there is bountiful peace and happiness, wealth and prosperity.”
Soundararajan said while the state went through difficulties during 2020, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, 2021 began with lot of optimism as the vaccination for Covid has started and is being administered on priority basis.
She claimed that with the combined and well-coordinated efforts of the central and state governments, the spread of the virus was effectively contained. “By strict implementation of the lockdown, and by offering the best medical treatment to the affected, the mortality rate in the state has been brought down to the lowest possible.”
A record number of above 76 lakh Covid tests were conducted across the state by setting up the centres even at the mandal level. In the state 2 lakh tests were conducted for every 10 lakh people, as against national average of 1.39 lakh tests.
The governor said though the state incurred a huge revenue loss of Rs 52,000 crore due to the disruption of activities caused by the pandemic, the state government continued all its welfare and social security schemes for the benefit of the poor.
The governor stated that the state government is taking plan-based measures to bailout agriculture sector from the crisis faced before formation of the state. The agriculture policies and programs launched by the state government have earned international acclaim. The state government has undertaken construction of major irrigation projects to overcome the lack of irrigational facilities faced by farmers for decades together. Irrigation facilities have been tremendously improved, thanks to Kaleshwaram project, the largest multistage lift irrigation project in the world.
The RythuBandhu scheme which is the first of its kind in the country was introduced to help the farmers as investment support for agriculture. It is being continued in spite of COVID resulted financial problems. For the Rabi season, the state government has extended a,7,351 crore assistance under the scheme to cover 60 lakh farmers owning 1.47 crore acres.
The Mission Bhagiratha programme which attracted attention of the entire country, has once for all solved the drinking water problem in the state. For 23,968 habitations in the state, safe and pure drinking water is supplied daily.
The governor said that owing to the IT policy brought in by the state government, world famous IT companies opened their offices in the state. IT companies are of the view that the Telangana is the right destination for operating their businesses as well as for the safety of their data. Amazon Web Services came forward to set up its Data Center Region with an investment of Rs 20,761 crore in Hyderabad. Multinational companies like Microsoft, Google, IBM, Oracle and others have also opened their office campuses in Hyderabad. The government has started IT hubs not only in Hyderabad but also at two-tier cities like Warangal, Karimnagar and Khammam.
The IT exports at the time of formation of the state were Rs 66,276 crore per year and in the last financial year it went up to Rs 1,28,807 crore.
She said work is on at a rapid pace to transform Hyderabad from a metropolitan city into an international metropolis. The lockdown period was put to best use to complete the road works, and bridges construction in the city. About 250 kms of BT roads were laid. The works undertaken under the Strategic Road Development Programme (SRDP) are progressing at a faster pace.
Stating that the maintenance of law and order is on the top of the agenda, the Governor said the state government is acting with an iron hand against anti-social elements and those harassing women.
“It is important to note that 65 per cent of the CCTV cameras installed in the country are in Telangana state. The Police Command Control Centre set up with state-of-the-art technology, which is the first of its kind in the country, will be opened soon in Hyderabad. The entire police department has been revamped for effective maintenance of law and order and for better coordination among the police stations.”
