Yogi highlights state govt’s achievements at Niti meet
LUCKNOW : Chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Saturday highlighted the achievements of his government during the past four years and hoped India and Uttar Pradesh would get a new direction of development with the joint efforts of the Union and state governments.
He said this while taking part in the sixth meeting of the Governing Council of NITI Aayog via video conference on Saturday. He thanked the PM for being a guiding light in tough Covid times and securing the country with two vaccines.
“Uttar Pradesh has become the first state in the country to administer Covid-19 vaccinations to 10 lakh people,” he said.
An official spokesman said the chief minister referred to the Niti Aayog’s agenda of making India a global manufacturing hub. By successfully implementing over 500 reforms under the Business Reform Action Plan, UP had moved from the
12th position to second in the country in the Ease of Doing Business Rankings.
The chief minister said the “Invest Mitra” portal had been set up to bring dynamism to investment promotion.
“As a result of the state’s positive policies, so far, proposals for investment of about Rs 45,000 crore had been received for 56 projects during the corona period,” he added.
“As against the MoUs of Rs 4, 68,000 crore signed at Uttar Pradesh Investors’ Summit, projects worth about Rs 3 lakh crore had been operationalised,” he said.
Food grain production in UP in 2016-17 was 558 lakh MT (metric tonnes) and had now increased to 602 lakh MT in 2019-20, he added. In this financial year, 35.76 lakh metric tonnes of wheat was procured from 6.63 lakh farmers through 5,896 procurement centres, for which a payment of Rs 6,885 crore was made, he said.
Besides a record paddy procurement of 66 lakh metric tonnes had been made till date from a total of 12,78,900 farmers, the chief minister added.
He also said that under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana, an amount of Rs 27,134 crore had been transferred to over 240 lakh farmers of the state through DBT (direct benefit transfer). Road, rail and air connectivity had been the priority of his government and Uttar Pradesh had become the premier state of the country with five major expressways, he said.
He also said work on the metro rail projects in Kanpur and Agra districts was in progress while metro and light metro transport systems were being considered seriously for Gorakhpur, Prayagraj, Varanasi, Jhansi and Meerut.
He said, “UP is committed to provide affordable, accessible, safe air services to common citizens by connecting each region to air services with the development of a world-class international airport at Jewar in Gautam Budh Nagar district; Kushinagar airport is ready for international flights. Soon, five international airports in the state will be ready in Lucknow, Varanasi, Kushinagar, Gautam Buddha Nagar, and Ayodhya. At present, seven airports in Lucknow, Agra, Varanasi, Gorakhpur, Kanpur, Prayagraj and Hindon are functional. Flights from Bareilly airport are commencing from March 8, 2021. Airport development in 10 other locations is in various stages of development.”