Hyderabad: A senior TD leader said, “It could be a coincidence but it is a significant one. While Mr Venkaiah Naidu talks about developing Vijayawada and Guntur as twin cities on par with Hyderabad and Secunderabad, Mr Chandrababu Naidu later confirms that the swearing-in will be somewhere between Vijayawada and Guntur. The land prices in and around Vijayawada and Guntur will skyrocket.”
Earlier, Mr Venkaiah Naidu had said creation of 100 smart cities and reducing interest rate on home loans to ensure housing for all would be the focus of the new urban development and housing and poverty alleviation ministry.
The urban development ministry will also give priority to linking of twin cities and infrastructure development of satellite towns and cleaning of religious cities across the country. “Housing is a priority area and it is my passion. My priority will be to ensure housing for all by 2020 and to reduce interest rate on home loans,” Mr Venkaiah Naidu said in New Delhi.
He said that during Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s regime, interest rate was brought down from 11 per cent to 7 per cent. Now it had again gone beyond 10 per cent. Terming the “affordable housing for all by 2020” scheme as his “most favourable agenda”, Mr Venkaiah Naidu said, “People of the country should be in a position to have ‘pucca’ houses”.
With NDA assuming power, the JNNURM project is coming to an end and there will be a new programme to develop infrastructure in cities. “JNNURM is coming to an end. The new phase for improving our cities will be launched soon. We will launch a new mission in place of JNNURM. The new mission will focus on modern concept for cities based on GIS-based planning and will have solid and liquid waste management to develop clean cities,” Mr Naidu added.
Describing the concept of smart cities, he said, “Our PM has a vision and we will give top priority to 100 smart new cities. These will have better environment, better connectivity and better living condition for people.”
