The Centre has no proposal to include millennium city Cuttack under the Heritage City Development and Augmentation Yojana (HRIDAY) for now.
Union Urban Development Minister Rao Inderjit Singh informed this in the Rajya Sabha in response to a question of BJD member Narendra Swain recently.
In a separate question, Swain wanted to know from Union Coal Minister Piyush Goyal when the Centre would cancel Tentulia coal block and allocate a suitable coalmine to the OPTCl, for which the Chief Minister has already made a proposal.
To this, Goyal informed the Upper House that a report had been sought from the Central Mine Planning and Design Institute ltd (CMPDI) on receipt of the Chief Minister’s request. The CMPDI report stated that Tentulai coal block is having geological reserves of 1,730 million tonnes with extractable reserves of around 700 MT which may be amenable to opencast mining.
The said report was referred to the Energy Department of the Odisha Government but the latter observed that the coal block would not be suitable for the OTPCl power plant due to technical and operational adversity. To bring about more clarity, a committee has been formed for survey. The report of the committee was still awaited, the Minister said.
To a question of Swain, Union Health and Family Welfare Minister Faggan Singh Kulaste revealed that Rs170 crore has been released in favour of the Odisha Government for establishment of five new medical colleges at Balangir, Koraput, Mayurbhanj, Baleswar and Puri. Further funds would be released after receiving utilisation certificates and physical progress of the proposed medicals, Kulaste said.