VISAKHAPATNAM: Visakhapatnam district stood first in education sector among three aspirational districts selected by Niti Aayog in the State. The other two districts are Vizianagaram and YSR Kadapa district.Replying to a query to YSRC MP Vijayasai Reddy in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday, Union Minister of State for Planning Rao Inderjit Singh said while the two districts were selected on the basis of composite index of backwardness, Visakhapatnam district was selected on the basis of left wing extremism affected district.
The minister replied to the MP that the focus areas under the aspirational district programme included health and nutrition, school education, agriculture and water resource management, financial inclusion and skill development and basic infrastructure. There are 49 key performance indicators in each sector, he said.
The minister said the three districts in the State have shown 14.5 per cent improvement on an average in these indicators from March 2018 to October 2019. Visakhapatnam stood first in recording fastest progress in education sector in January 2019 and thus it became eligible for an additional allocation of `3 crore, the minister said.
The break up of 100 per cent composite index for selection of aspirational districts is as under: Landless households dependent on manual labour 25 per cent, ante-natal care 7.5 per cent, institutional delivery 7.5 per cent, stunting of children below five years 7.5 per cent, wasting of children below five years 7.5 per cent, elementary dropout rate 7.5 per cent, adverse pupil teacher ratio 7.5 per cent, un-electrified households 7.5 per cent, households without individual toilets 7.5 per cent, unconnected PMGSY villages 7.5 per cent and rural households without access to water 7.5 per cent, the minister said.
In reply to another question on University Grants Commission (UGC) guidelines for filling vacant faculty posts, Union Minister for Human Resource Development Ramesh Pokhriyal replying to Vijayasai Reddy said that the UGC had directed all higher education institutes to fill up the vacant posts.
The minister said advertisements have already been issued for the vacant posts in National Institutes of Technology (NIT), School of Planning and Architecture (SPA), central universities, Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and other institutions. Meanwhile, a delegation of YSRC MPs led by party leader Vijayasai Reddy called on Union External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and urged him to take steps for the release of 22 fishermen, languishing in Pakistan.