T.N. government will prioritise widening Jayankondam-Kumbakonam highway, says Minister

The Detailed Project Report (DPR) to widen the 18-km stretch between Jayankondam and Madhanathur and the 12-km stretch between Madhanathur and Kumbakonam is under the consideration of the State government, said Minister for Public Works and Highways E.V. Velu in the Assembly on Wednesday (April 23, 2025).
The Minister was responding to a question by Jayankondam MLA Ka.So.Ka. Kannan who sought to widen the existing two-way lane into a four-way lane between Jayankondam to Kumbakonam. Mr. Velu said under the Chief Minister Road Development Programme (CMRDP), the two-way lane for a stretch of 48 km between Vriddachalam and Jayankondam had been converted into a four-way lane at a cost of ₹200 crore. The stretch was made available for public use.
Similarly, the DPR to convert the 30-km stretch between Jayankondam to Kumbakonam is under the State government's consideration and it will be taken up on a priority basis under the Tamil Nadu Road Sector Project (TNRSP), he added.

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Hans India

2 hours ago

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HDK can neither win nor form government, asserts Shivakumar

Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar on Friday hit out at Union Minister H D Kumaraswamy saying he will neither win nor form a government in Karnataka. Speaking to reporters at his Sadashivanagar residence, he said, 'Kumaraswamy had called on his supporters to get ready for a BJP-JDS government. I had then replied to him stating that I will present him a suit if he won the election and formed the government in 2028.' He was replying to a reporter who Kumaraswamy's statement that he wasn't that poor to take clothes from him. 'The Housing Minister has only transferred the quota of minorities from rural areas to urban area as the number of minorities is low in the rural areas. The quota is not being snatched from anyone to give it to minorities,' he clarified. 'As per the Sachar Committee report, minorities were given quota in rural areas also. But the quota was not being utilised as the number of minorities in rural areas was low. It is now being transferred from rural areas to urban areas. We are not snatching away anything from anyone. As much as 90% of the SC/STs have been given homes. The government can't provide funds unless they lay the foundation for the house,' he explained. 'Opposition parties are politicising this, let them do it. The government can't incur losses due to flats lying vacant. We had given the opportunity for SC/STs and their quota was over. We then transferred it to backward classes and general categories. We are a government which believes in equal life and equal share philosophy. Let them discuss our work in the Assembly session,' he added. Asked about B R Patil's accusation that houses are allotted under Rajiv Gandhi housing scheme only if bribes are paid, he said he was not aware of it.

The Hindu

14 hours ago

• The Hindu

My biggest challenge is to draft policies for an unplanned city, says Delhi CM Rekha Gupta

Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta was the inaugural guest at the new series of thoughtful conversations, The Hindu 'Mind', launched and curated by The Hindu. She speaks to Nistula Hebbar on a host of issues facing the national capital and her plans to address them. Edited excerpts: You completed 100 days as CM on May 30. What has been the biggest challenge you faced in this period? Actually, I could not even imagine that the arrangements for the whole of Delhi were so challenging. Staying outside the system, I saw that Delhi was running. But when I stood inside the system, I saw that Delhi was running like a vehicle without wheels, at the mercy of fate with no holistic planning for Delhi and its infrastructure, its needs. I soon realised that the expectations of the people of Delhi, which is the capital of the country, had shrunk to such an extent that a Delhiite today does not want to ask anything big from you. His wishes have been limited to such an extent that all he is asking you is to just get the drain in front of his house fixed. It is as if Delhiites have lost all scope of thinking bigger than that in the last 20-25 years. So that is the challenge that I see – a condition where you have to start from almost zero, that you don't have any count of the population of an unplanned city which is the capital of the country. There is no draft of what you want to do and how will you do it. There is no vision for this. That continues to be the biggest challenge. Nowadays we have seen a lot that there is a lot of bitterness and acrimony in the political culture. Since you took over, have you had any interaction with the two former CMs, Arvind Kejriwal and Atishi? I have not had any interaction with Arvind Kejriwal because I think that the day the results came, he immediately picked up his bag and left for Punjab. Punjab is also where you went for campaigning for the Ludhiana bypoll. I had gone to look for him. I thought I should find him. Did you meet him there? I did not meet him but I did convey via my meetings there that the people of Delhi are calling you [Kejriwal]. Till yesterday you were the son of Delhi and now suddenly you have become the son of Punjab. I conveyed to the people of Punjab the wounds that he has given to Delhi. But I get to meet Atishiji during the Assembly session. I remember that in the first session, those people [Aam Aadmi Party MLAs] made big noise and came with placards that you people [the government] have removed the photographs Bhagat Singhji and Babasaheb Ambedkar from office of the CM. I asked my security to let Atishiji and other AAP MLAs enter my office. I made them sit and gave them tea and said, look bhai, you have the photographs here, I am also there, the room is also the same. Why are you making this noise? I understand that one should continue efforts to talk to the Opposition. The two big campaign issues for the BJP in the Delhi poll were the alleged excise scam and the 'Sheesh Mahal' issue. What is happening there? The Arvind Kejriwal government's excise policy, in which he gave free liquor with one purchase, was unprecedented. And similarly, he built a Sheesh Mahal for himself. The negative reaction in terms of poll results to the Sheesh Mahal was also because it was done by someone who used to sit in Ramlila Maidan and say that I don't want anything, no car, no bungalow, not even any post, and later went on to acquire everything. Both these subjects touch the public and we want to take decisions after a lot of thought. We want to bring a very transparent and people-friendly excise policy and for this we have done a lot of homework to find out comparative policies in other States, a policy in which the standards of society, revenue parameters should be met with complete transparency. We have engaged a team of our officers to go into it, and we will be able to bring a good, transparent and economically viable excise policy for Delhi very soon. As for the Sheesh Mahal, it has become like a white elephant for the government. But I definitely assure the people of Delhi that every penny of taxpayers' money will be fully utilised. Some people feel that it should be made a State guest house, others feel that it should be sold, still others feel it should be a museum. Some people have also suggested that I should stay in it. Will you? No, I had made it clear on the first day itself that I don't want to be in it. We will bring a proposal that it should be useful for the public and the government should generate revenue from it. We speak about developed Delhi but recently we have seen incidents like the fire in a residential complex in Dwarka where to save their lives, some people jumped from the ninth floor because the Fire Department people took a lot of time in arriving. We are in the process of addressing this. We have made a provision in our budget for upgrading of facilities for disaster management, on how to deal with floods, earthquakes, the possibilities of these disasters happening. We started dealing with all these things in just 100 days and have started planning for it. In 2023, the then government in Delhi was totally unprepared for the kind of floods that happened. The barricades of the [Yamuna] barrage could not be opened since they had remained closed for years, and the water could not flow out. Today we know that the rains are about to start, so before that we have completed the meetings on disaster management, flood management and everything else, completed the preparations, de-silting of drains in which in just four months we have removed 20 lakh metric tons of silt. The monsoon is almost upon us. Last year, the city saw massive urban waterlogging. What is your plan to deal with it? Every year, in June, the same photo of a bus stuck under a waterlogged Minto Bridge is published. The Congress government got 15 years, AAP got 11 years… they could not solve the problem created every year at one place. But today I can assure you that Minto Bridge will not be flooded. Not only Minto Bridge, we have identified all the waterlogging points in Delhi. For each of these points we have appointed a nodal officer to suggest solutions and who will be held responsible for any waterlogging there, on the premise that only through accountability and resources can you solve an intractable issue. Today I invite Kejriwalji to come… you ruled for 11 years, I am standing on the record of 100 days. Debate with me. What should have happened in Delhi and what did you do? Looking at your campaign for the Ludhiana bypoll, will you be going to Punjab during the Assembly election in 2027? Yes, 100%. Delhi has been pushed back 50 years by the AAP government in 11 years. It is my social responsibility that no other State of the country falls into the trap of such deceptive people. Lately, the issue of fee hikes by private schools has hit the headlines. You have brought the Delhi school education ordinance. Why not debate it in the Assembly first? Private schools are increasing their fees abnormally every year, but even today, private schools in Delhi are governed by the Delhi School Education Act, 1973 and nowhere in that Act is anything written about what schools should do to increase fees. There is just a line that says that you should increase your fees and intimate the Directorate of Education. The government used to go to court and used to fail because there was no law. For the first time after coming to power, we made a framework for it so that the schools can be governed. As for the ordinance route, the problem was that as soon as our government was formed, school admissions had started with some schools increasing fees. 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They do not study because they know that we have not given the structure to the schools where their own children can study. So it is the responsibility of the government to make government schools better so that private schools will automatically come down. Interestingly, when we talk education at the university level and even at the postgraduation level, where do people want to go? They want to go to a government institution. We want that same preference for school education. The state of the Yamuna river has become a chronic issue for the city. What are your plans with regard to this forever problem? Look, this is the misfortune of the city. What we are now calling a problem was once the lifeline of Delhi, its claim to beauty. Slowly, when people started coming to Delhi in a non-planned manner, and governments never worried about what kind of infrastructure should be there. People kept settling down and sewers, drains, gutters kept falling directly into Yamunaji. And as this pile-up continued for years, the condition of Yamunaji became like that of a drain. There was much talk by previous governments that we will clean the Yamuna, but without addressing the things that have made the river dirty. Today, about 200 drains of Delhi fall into the Yamuna. Every drain in the entire city has its own shape and at some places, the drain is bigger than the river. The one which is called Sahibi river is Najafgarh drain, which falls completely into the Yamuna. We have made a detailed plan. For the first time, the government is seriously surveying through drones drains that are falling into the Yamuna and the amount of silt in it. For the first time, we have removed 20 lakh metric tons of silt from big drains through machines. The procedure and plan for tapping each drain is being followed. Decentralised sewage treatment plants (STPs) should be built on all the drains. We have allocated funds for the revival of existing STPs. Cleaning the Yamuna is not a one-day job, it will take around four-five years till all these decentralised STP plants are started. All the 1,750 unauthorised colonies in Delhi will have to have sewers that will have to be tapped so that not even a single drop of dirty water goes into Yamunaji. The e-flow of Yamuna will have to be increased, natural water will have to be created in it. A major issue with regard to Delhi is air pollution, which becomes particularly bad in what was once the most beautiful season in the city – autumn – and winter because of stubble burning. What are your plans to tackle this? First we need to recall what Kejriwal sahab used to say about fixing air pollution. He used to speak of a medicine that would get rid of stubble and that would fix the air in Delhi. Where is that medicine? Next, he used to speak of odd-even [traffic rule], which only made people buy an extra car, one with an odd number, another with even. To say all this, they spent ₹8 crore on advertisement. Then we came to know that a smog tower was installed somewhere. Only one was installed in 11 years, cost ₹25 lakh and malfunctioned within 6 months. To fix pollution, we need both intentions and policies. So, you will need the support of other governments to solve pollution – both Punjab and Haryana and the multiple agencies within NCR. We have made a plan to convert the public transport in Delhi to only electric vehicles and till now we have put 700 electric buses on the roads. We are planning to take the public transport completely on non-emission mode. We are trying to motivate the public to gradually completely shift from CNG to electric. As far as dust pollution is concerned, not just for the winter months but all year round, we installed 1,000 water sprinklers all over the city, since even today, if your AQI (Air Quality Index) gets higher, GRAP (Graded Response Action Plan) is imposed by the court. So these sprinklers should run for 12 months and smog guns should be installed on all high-rise buildings. But how will you deal with this specific issue of stubble? Because that is outside the State, right? Haryana has just set up a plant where they buy stubble from farmers and after processing it, put it to some other use. We must attempt to set up more such plants in the same way, in Haryana, Punjab, U.P., which are on our NCR boundaries, and take their help. As far as I told you about vehicles in Delhi, we will have to certify even those vehicles which come from outside Delhi. The work we are doing is for the benefit of the public but it will take time. You can judge the performance in a time-bound manner. Why is it that Noida, Gurugram, the places around NCR are attracting business, housing, but not Delhi? We have had governments in Delhi which said that they we will turn Delhi into London, Paris. My point is to let Delhi remain Delhi only. Previous governments have created such a difficult situation in Delhi that no one can work here. Firstly, instead of maintaining talking terms with the multiple agencies running Delhi, you start abusing them, that the L-G did this, or the PM did that, etc. So which agency will stay here? Who will be able to work? Today the rate of electricity in Delhi is higher than in the whole country. Because you have made one segment completely free, while the industrial sector has to pay as much as ₹18 per unit of electricity. So you will have to do something to flatten it. If people want to come here and work, then we will have to bring a new industrial policy, a new warehousing policy. We have planned a traders' welfare board so that someone can also listen to the voice of the traders. Ease of doing business, single-window system, all this will have to be done to make Delhi trader-friendly, industry-friendly. One of the most important factors for this is a master plan, which will come very soon with proposals for land reforms. We are developing things related to infrastructure for our industrial areas. Currently, for different taxes, licences, people have to go to different agencies. All these issues are on the table. This is actually a very good time for Delhi for all this with the MCD (Municipal Corporation of Delhi), Delhi government and Central government all being headed by the same party, a triple-engine government. Your term has just begun, but what do you wish to see as your legacy? My only goal is that when the public sees me, they should honestly feel that yes, our Chief Minister is here, working for us, doing everything she can for the welfare of the people.

Hans India

a day ago

• Hans India

NDA set to secure massive victory in Bihar, says Chhattisgarh Dy CM

Raipur: Chhattisgarh Deputy Chief Minister Arun Sao on Friday exuded confidence that the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) will return to power in Bihar with a resounding majority in the upcoming Assembly elections. Speaking to IANS, Arun Sao said, 'The direction in which Bihar is progressing today is a testament to the transformative leadership of the NDA. Under the stewardship of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Bihar has seen a dramatic shift in both development and governance. Those who once looted and ruined the state are now anxious and nervous because the people are choosing progress over propaganda.' He further lauded the Centre's proactive foreign policy and rapid response in times of global crises. 'Whether it was the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the COVID-19 pandemic, or the ongoing tensions between Israel and Iran, the Modi-led government has consistently safeguarded Indian citizens abroad. "The 'Operation Sindhu', aimed at evacuating Indians from Iran, is already underway, demonstrating the government's commitment to every Indian, whether at home or overseas,' Sao added. Meanwhile, political turbulence continues in the Mahagathbandhan camp. With Assembly polls scheduled for October–November, internal strife over seat-sharing has begun to surface. The alliance, comprising the Congress, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), and Left parties, appears fractured over key issues like candidates and the choice of a chief ministerial face. The Congress has refrained from publicly endorsing RJD scion Tejashwi Yadav as the alliance's CM candidate, fueling speculation of a deeper rift. Adding further political momentum, PM Modi is on a two-day tour of Bihar, Odisha, and Andhra Pradesh on June 20–21. He is expected to lay the foundation stone and inaugurate multiple development projects in Siwan, followed by a public address. As the election drumbeats grow louder, Bihar is poised for a high-stakes political battle, with both the NDA and the Opposition sharpening their strategies for a decisive contest.