BHUBANESWAR: The State Cabinet on Wednesday approved a proposal to give permission to the Railways to construct overbridges across rivers, canal, mahara, nala and roads free of premium and incidental charges.
The Cabinet meeting, chaired by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, however, decided that the Railways have to make one-time payment capitalised value of land revenue equivalent to 25 times of the annual ground rent and cess taken together.
At present, there is no policy decision of the State Government to realise or not to realise any amount from the Railways towards grant of permission for construction of overbridge. In the absence of policy guidelines, the field-level revenue authorities are charging premium, capitalised value of revenue land, incidental charges while processing such proposals.
Such permissive use is different from lease in the sense that no right or title over the land is given to them. The railway authorities cannot infringe upon the community rights over the land and obstruct the natural flow of water.
Since it will not be justified to charge premium, cost of the land and incidental charges on permissive use of such land for construction of overbridges, the State Government decided that Railways have to make one-time payment of capitalised value of the land revenue.
In another decision, the Cabinet empowered the Finance Department to issue notification for imposition of new tax or change of tax rate and exemption of tax under the Odisha Goods and Services Tax Act 2017 as and when recommended by the GST Council with the permission of the Chief Minister, Finance Minister Sashi Bhusan Behera told reporters.
The State Cabinet approved a proposal of the Higher Education department for modifications in Kalinga Sikhya Sathi Yojana, an interest subvention scheme of the Government to provide financial assistance to students against educational loans.
In case of temporary default in repayment of educational loans up to a period of 90 days, the interest subvention will be made applicable. If the default in repayment is beyond 90 days, the Government assistance will be available if the loan account becomes standard account after repayment of arrear interest and principal, said Law Minister Pratap Jena.