Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has decided to take up four new areas under the Rurban Mission in the state. With this, a total of 14 areas have been included under the Mission.
A decision to this effect was taken at the State Level Empowerment Committee ( SLEC) meeting presided over by Chief secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi at the State Secretariat here on Friday.
Considering the proposed micro action plans, Padhi directed to focus on new income generating avenues and sustainable livelihood supporting activities in each cluster. He also directed to prioritize the projects for enhancing basic service delivery.
The action plans for these areas were designed keeping in view the development of well planned rurban clusters in future. The investment for development of these four new areas was estimated around Rs 305.65 crore which would be invested through four different ICAP (Integrated Cluster Development Plan) designed for each area.
Present at the meeting, Principal Secretary, Panchyati Raj, Deoranjan Kumar Singh said that earlier 10 semi-urban and peri-urban areas were included under Rurban Mission in two phases. The SLEC approved four new areas for inclusion in Phase-III of the Mission. These areas include Puttasingh of Rayagada district, Marichmal of Koraput district, Kuarmunda of Sundargarh district and Raibania of Balasore district covering 20 Gram Panchayat areas.
It was envisaged that the projects of worth Rs 230.34 crore would be implemented through convergence of various programmes and schemes while the remaining Rs 75.30 crore would be provided both by Central and the state government on 60:40 sharing basis as Critical Gap Funding (CGF)
The projects for economic infrastructure, skill development, establishment of agro-processing units, inter-village connectivity, piped water supply, irrigation, solid waste management, digital connectivity, street lights, sanitation , sustainable livelihood , health services, citizen service center, LPG connections etc were found as common felt needs in these areas.
“These clusters would be developed as Rurban villages preserving the nature and essence of rural community life with urban facilities”, said Pranab Jyoti Nath, Mission Leader. He said the IACP approved in the SLEC would be sent to the Centre for acceptance.
State Nodal Officer of the Mission, Swayam Prava Mohanty said, “Each cluster would be developed and managed as one planning area.
Principal Secretary, Finance, Tuhin Kant Pandey, Principal Secretary, School & Mass Education, Pradipta Kumar Mohapatra, Secretary, SC & ST Development, R Raghu Prasad and senior officials of the concerned departments were present at the meeting.
