Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh on Wednesday laid the foundation stone for the Rs 6,000 crore NTPC-BHEL power plant while showering praises on the former chief minister, Dr Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, terming him the “champion” of the project.
It was after several postponed visits in the last two years that the Prime Minister finally arrived in Tirupati and launched the much-awaited project, incidentally on the eve of YSR’s first death anniversary.
“Tomorrow will be the first death anniversary of Rajasekharji,” he said while addressing a gathering of officials and people’s representatives at Mannavaram village, 52 km from here. “It was his untiring efforts that brought this project to the backward area of Chittoor district.”
The Prime Minister added that Mannavaram would ever reflect the great love and affection of YSR for the people of his state and a testimony to his concern for their welfare. Whenever Dr Singh uttered the name of YSR, applause erupted from the back benches, filled with a thin crowd of Mannavaram villagers.
Dr Singh also congratulated the union minister for power, Mr Sushil Kumar Shinde, the Union minister for heavy industries, Mr Vilasrao Deshmukh, and the chief minister, Mr K. Rosaiah, for the meticulous planning that went into the project and the speedy allotment of land for it.
“It exemplifies the importance of coordination between the Central government and the state governments,” he said.
The Prime Minister called for bridging the gap between the supply and demand of power to target higher economic growth on a sustained basis. “Availability of affordable power is of critical importance for India’s development,” he said. “We have an ambitious programme for additional power generation capacity in the 11th and 12th five year plans and it means a much larger demand for power equipment.”
Dr Singh hoped that the Mannavaram project would achieve its targets with the vast experience and expertise of the NTPC and BHEL and added that it would be able to produce power equipment required for additional capacity of 5,000 MW per year by 2014-15.
“It will provide direct employment to 6,000 men and women and indirect employment to another 25,000,” he said. “I appreciate the vision of the state government to have a large industrial hub around this plant.”
Earlier, Mr Shinde and Mr Deshmukh also lavished praise on YSR and recalled his efforts to get Mannavaram project for AP, though there was a tough competition among other states.
Mr Desmukh termed the mega project a boon from Lord Venkateswara. “It will be the best unit in our country,” he said.