KTR flays Centre for discriminating against Telangana

Centre is denying denying funds and projects, alleges Minister

Minister for IT and Industries K.T. Rama Rao has come down heavily against the discriminatory attitude of the BJP-led government at the Centre against nascent Telangana by not sanctioning funds and projects in addition to not keeping the promises made in the Bifurcation Act.

In his reply to the discussion (voting) on demands for grants pertaining to the Industries and Commerce, Information Technology, Electronics and Communications in the Assembly on Thursday, he said the Centre had recognised two National Investment and Manufacturing Zones (NIMZ) in 2016 (Zaheerabad) and 2017 (Pharma City). However, it could trickle only ₹3 crore and ₹5 crore, respectively, to the two special industrial estates.

The Centre had also not responded to any of the Telangana’s requests to sanction four industrial corridors – Hyderabad-Nagapur, Hyderabad-Mumbai, Hyderabad-Bengaluru and Hyderabad-Vijayawada, and instead shifted the defence industrial production corridor from Hyderabad to Budelkhand in Uttar Pradesh although the latter had no ecosystem, infrastructure besides being non-strategic and seismic-prone location, Mr. Rama Rao said.

However, irrespective of any cooperation and assistance from the Centre, Telangana could make big strides in many sectors. Quoting an October 2021 report of RBI, the Minister said Telangana is 11 th largest in terms of geography and 12 th largest in terms of population, but it had grown as the 4 th largest contributor to the country’s economy.

The per capita income which was ₹1.24 lakh in 2014 had increased to ₹2.78 lakh by 2021 and the GSDP had gone up to ₹11.54 lakh crore in 2021 from ₹4.9 lakh crore in 2014.

“Having 2.5% of the country’s population, Telangana is making up 5% of the country’s GDP and it’s feeding development of States like Rajasthan and UP”, Mr. Rama Rao said. The Centre had also not given anything to mega textile park coming up at Warangal.

He stated that IT exports from the State were at ₹1.45 lakh crore in 2021 from ₹57,000 crore in 2014 and the IT sector employee strength had gone up from 3 lakh to 6.29 lakh during the period. In other terms, Hyderabad is adding 3 out of 10 IT employees added by the sector every year.