Chennai: Chief Minister Edappadi Palanisami on Monday noted that during his recent visit to New Delhi, he met Union road transport, highways and shipping minister, Nitin Gadkari and submitted a memorandum seeking Rs 75 crore as interim relief to the state for providing solatium to fishermen.
About 104 kilometres of coastal areas from Tiruvallur and Chennai through to the Kancheepuram coast were affected due to the slick and the state is constantly removing the oil deposition, he said.
Earlier in the day, he distributed solatium of '5,000 each to 30,000 fishermen, whose livelihood was affected. Emphasising that the state would build as many as 5,000 houses for the homeless fishermen - for this a budget allocation of Rs 85 crore had been sanctioned - the chief minister said. He also pointed out the development work completed by his late leader Jayalalithaa at RK Nagar and said more infra work is in the pipeline to develop RK Nagar in north Chennai.
In another function, the chief minister handed over drought relief to farmers from all the 31 districts. After a token inaugural, Palanisami said that his government has directed all district collectors to deposit the relief assistance to the farmers in their respective bank accounts.
The state government on February 21 had announced a special drought relief package for Rs 2,247 crore. Bank account details of about 32 lakh farmers have been collected and the relief will be credited directly to account holders.
The assistance would be given at the rate of '5,465 per acre for affected paddy and other irrigation crops, Rs 3,000 for rain fed crops, Rs 7,287 per acre for long-term crops and between Rs 2,428 and Rs 3,000 per acre for silk worm rearing, a press release from the secretariat said.
