Hyderabad: The decks have been cleared for setting up private universities in Telangana state. The TS Cabinet, which met at the Secretariat on Saturday for over three hours, approved the long-pending proposal to set up private universities.
A Cabinet sub-committee headed by Deputy Chief Minister and education minister Kadiam Srihari has been constituted to finalise the modalities of setting up private universities.
The decision assumed significance in the backdrop of reports that Reliance Group has recently expressed its willingness to set up a huge campus on the city’s outskirts, spread over 2,000 to 3,000 acres, offering education from kindergarten to postgraduate level on par with global standards. The Cabinet meeting was held ahead of the Assembly session starting on December 16.
Cabinet clears new land Act
The government will now have something in hand with which to counter the Opposition’s onslaught on delay in clearing crop loans, delays in fee reimbursement, and Arogyasri arrears. The government would like the session to highlight the achievements of the 2.5 years of TRS rule.
The Cabinet also approved the new TS Land Acquisition Bill, 2016, which will be introduced in the Assembly for approval. The Bill will speed up acquisition of land for irrigation and infrastructure projects to replace GO 123, which has been facing legal hurdles and resulted in a huge delay in acquiring lands for the Mallannasagar project.
The new law is within the purview of the Centre’s Land Acquisition Act, 2013, with special emphasis on means of overcoming the time-consuming land acquisition process. The state government feels it will be difficult to acquire land faster under the central Act.
Special provisions will exempt irrigation projects, roads, and laying of drinking water pipelines from the lengthy land acquisition process. There is, however, no major change with regard to compensation, rehabilitation and resettlement.
Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Karnataka, and Kerala have already made their own land acquisition legislation.
Another decision taken at the Cabinet meeting was to encourage cashless transactions on a massive scale; another Cabinet subcommittee headed by IT minister K.T. Rama Rao will recommend measures to achieve this goal.
It was decided to henceforth make all government payments in all departments only through online mode.
The Cabinet also decided to rationalise personnel working in its various departments and transfer those in departments with less work to departments where there is more work. The CM directed ministers to attend the Assembly session after doing proper homework to counter any Opposition criticism.
