Andhra Govt To Extend NREGP

Hyderabad: The Andhra Pradesh Government has determined to expand the National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (NREGP) to all the mandals across the State from April 1 next year. This employment programme is currently being implemented in 656 mandals of 13 districts providing job cards to 81 lakh families. Of these, 64.8 lakh people of 42 lakh families have been benefited. The Chief Minister''s Office, the Chief Minister, Dr Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, who reviewed the progress of welfare schemes on Dec 23, said the Government will shortly depute a delegation to the Centre to make a presentation on the State''s success stories, including the supply of free power to the Planning Commission. While the number of service connections reported significant increase, the State Government was able to continue free power supply to the agriculture sector. While the number of connections increased from 23.74 lakh in 2004-05 to 25.27 lakh in 2006-07, the overall power consumption went up from 13,394 million units to 15,640 million units.