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Andhra Pradesh cabinet decides to revamp village, ward secretariats
Briefing reporters after the cabinet meeting, state information and public relations minister Kolusu Parthasarathy said the cabinet decided to rationalise 11,162 village secretariats and 3,842 ward secretariats established by the previous YSR Congress party government and readjust their staff.
The Andhra Pradesh state cabinet chaired by chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu on Friday decided to revamp the existing village and ward secretariats to improve their efficiency in extending various services to the people.
Briefing reporters after the cabinet meeting, state information and public relations minister Kolusu Parthasarathy said the cabinet decided to rationalise 11,162 village secretariats and 3,842 ward secretariats established by the previous YSR Congress party government and readjust their staff.
“At present, each village secretariat has 11 employees and each ward secretariat has 10 employees. The cabinet decided to readjust them to enhance the effectiveness of real-time governance at the village and ward levels,” the minister said.
Accordingly, these secretariats would be categorised into three types: Category A comprises secretariats with a population above 3,501 and each of them will have eight employees; Category B secretariats are for a population between 2,501 and 3,500 and each of them will have seven employees; and Category C has secretariats with a population below 2,500 and they will have six employees each. “Surplus employees will be redeployed to other departments based on their eligibility,” he said.
The minister said panchayat secretaries will head village secretariats, while ward administrative secretaries will head ward secretariats. The employees are divided into three groups: multi-purpose functionaries, technical functionaries, and aspirational functionaries.
“While technical functionaries will work in association with agriculture and panchayat raj departments, the aspirational functionaries will deal with advanced technology such as drones, artificial intelligence, and internet,” he said.
The cabinet also discussed the issue of bringing in reforms in land administration such as removal of freehold lands and prohibition of properties under Section 22-A of the Registration Act, 1908. “Of the total 13.59 lakh acres of land under 22A, about 13.57 lakh acres have been verified by the government. It was revealed that some people had allegedly attempted to unlawfully gain ownership of these lands by converting them into freehold lands,” he said, adding that the government will review allegations of irregularities in re-surveys and take necessary action.
The cabinet approved an additional loan of ₹700 crore from National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) for AP Marketing Federation to continue paddy procurement operations. The government would extend the guarantee for this loan, the minister said, adding that the government would ensure payments to farmers within 24 hours of procuring paddy.
“This season, the government has procured 28.83 lakh metric tonnes of paddy from approximately 4.6 lakh farmers and disbursed ₹6,469 crore,” he said.
The cabinet approved setting up 63 Anna Canteens in the remaining 62 assembly constituencies under various Urban Development Authorities at an estimated cost of ₹38.43 crore. The state already has 203 operational Anna Canteens providing clean meals at ₹5 a plate.
The cabinet also finalised the guidelines for distributing house sites for the landless poor. Each eligible poor family will be given three cents of house site in rural areas and two cents in urban areas under the “Houses for All Poor” programme.
“The eligible BPL families should not have benefitted from any previous housing schemes and must possess Aadhaar cards,” Parthasarathy said, adding families with land exceeding 5 acres in hilly regions or 2.5 acres in plain regions are ineligible for the scheme.
The cabinet approved regularisation of houses built on unobjectionable government lands occupied by the poor as of October 15, 2019. This decision supersedes all previous government orders on this issue, the minister added.
