CM Fadnavis instructs strengthening of institutional capacity of districts to make Maha economy $1 trillion
SANJAY JOG
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Thursday instructed to strengthen institutional capacity in districts through the State Data Policy in each district to increase the state's Gross Domestic Product (GSDP) by 14.5 percent every year to make the state's economy a trillion dollar. He was speaking at the meeting of the governing board of the Maharashtra Institution for Transformation (MITRA) which is formed as a think tank on the lines of NITI Aayog in November 2022 to provide strategic, technical, and functional direction for the state’s development.
CM’s directives come at a time when state government faces capital formation challenges as Maharashtra’s budget has on,y 12 percent outlay on capital formation. State’s gross capital formation as part of GSDP is only 23-24 percent and raising taxes or reducing subsidies are not a viable option and other options need to be explored raising international capital and monetisation of idle public assets.
The state government is raising $188 million from the World Bank for strengthening districts, $500 million has been raised from Asian Development Bank for strengthening of tertiary health care, $280 million mobilised from World Bank under SMART project, $500 million for flood water diversion of Krishna waters to drought prone areas and $1 billion is being raised from AIB for providing 5 lakh solar pumps to farmers.
He also directed to deepen small irrigation projects outside the catchment area of large dams and construct new storage tanks with the financial assistance of the World Bank for flood control in Kolhapur and Sangli districts.
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The MITRA CEO Pravin Pardeshi made a presentation on the measures that can be taken to formulate the necessary policies to make the state's economy a trillion dollars. Also, a review of the MahaSTRIDE (MaharashtravStrengthening of Institutional Capabilities in Districts for Enabling Growth) project and the Maharashtra Responsive Development Project was taken. The Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for the preliminary project report to be submitted to the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, Government of India was approved on this occasion.
The chief minister directed to present the project implemented by the World Bank and external assistance as per the time-bound program given in the SOP.
To speed up government work and provide training to officers and employees, MITRA today signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Universal AI University in the presence of the chief minister.
Also, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed among MITRA, Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai (IIT Mumbai), VoRGpedia and other organizations to increase the use of artificial intelligence in government work.