Other States - Orissa   

Roll out infrastructure projects, Centre tells states

BHUBANESWAR: The Union government on Tuesday asked State governments to roll out infrastructure projects, which could be built up through Public Private Partnerships (PPP) model and the Centre was ready to assist those projects with viability gap funding (VGF) scheme.

Addressing workshop on “States on Public Private Partnerships” organised by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Additional Secretary of Department of Economic Affairs in Ministry of Finance, Sindhushree Khullar said the PPP route was the unavoidable option to reduce the glaring the infrastructure deficit.

State governments should immediately start planning the infrastructure projects and attract private sector investments for the purpose, Ms. Khullar said.

Speaking on the occasion, Arvind Mayaram, Joint Secretary in Ministry of Finance, said 30 per cent of $ 500 billion investment for infrastructure creation in the country would have to come from the private sector.

Infrastructure bottlenecks were suppressing country’s economic growth rate by 1.2 per cent annually, he said.

Ms. Khullar said Centre had approved 23 projects, which were to be implemented in PPP mode.

About 200 such projects which envisaged investment to the tune of Rs 2000 crore had been lined up, she said adding that bidding process would start soon.

“All these projects were eligible for viability gap funding,” Ms. Khullar said.

The Centre was promoting airport, port and energy sector development through PPP and encouraging the states to go for state highways, urban infrastructure and rural roads through the mode. Last year, the Centre sanctioned $ 50 billion infrastructure projects, of which centre contributed $ 6 billion, Central PSUs $ 20 billion, States $ 11 billion and private sector $ 11 billion.

S. Nandakumar, regional head of South India, FITCH Ratings, gave a detailed presentation on the methodology for grading infrastructure projects. R N Bohidar, Additional Chief Secretary & Development Commissioner of Orissa, and Santosh Mohapatra, Vice-Chairman of CII Orissa State Council were present.

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