Bizz Buzz Bureau Amaravati

Besidesgiving its stamp of approval to 11 projects envisaged with an investment of Rs9,076 crore mostly in the tourism sector, the State Cabinet on Friday sanctioned 10 multi-village drinking water works at a cost of Rs 9,355 crore.

The Cabinet met at Velagapudi Secretariat with Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu in the chair, in all took up for discussion over 30 agenda points. The meeting gave approval to 2,943 drinking water projects costing Rs1,811.81 crore in severe water-stressed areas. It was decided to take up work on modernisation of Peddagudda Reservoir command area and Kuppam and Beeragaipalle reservoirs.

A proposal to set up a special court of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in Visakhapatnam was cleared. The court will take up NIA cases.

The meeting gave its consent for acquisition of 63.01 acres in Tirupati district and establishing a logistics park. The Cabinet approved a proposal to organise concerts across the State and encourage opening of a large aquarium and office complex for the National Fisheries Development Board. Clearance was also given to consider allotment of land to CII Global Leadership Centre, Art of Living and Isha Foundation in Amaravati.

Following serious deliberations on social media and spread of falsehood by spreading fake videos using AI, Naidu directed the Ministers to launch a counter-campaign by Opposition vested interests to tarnish the image of the government. He said all those responsible for misusing social media with false narratives should be brought to book. A power-point presentation was also given on how social media was being misused.

At the meeting, Naidu asked the Ministers and senior officials to accord more thrust on speed of doing business. All the decisions taken at the 19th State Investment Promotion Board (SIPB) for allowing investments worth Rs9,076.11 crore across 11 projects expected to generate 10,531 employment opportunities in the State were tarified at the Cabinet.

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu directed the officials to promote industrialisation to provide additional income opportunities for farming families and enable them to emerge as entrepreneurs. He emphasised on attracting investments to strengthen the rural economy and called for leveraging the growing demand for ethanol.The Chief Minister said that increasing ethanol blending to 40 per cent would provide significant additional income to maize farmers. He instructed officials to actively encourage investments in the ethanol manufacturing sector, noting that ethanol demand would increase substantially for blending with petrol and diesel.