Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Wednesday requested Union HRD Minister Smriti Zubin Irani to forward its project proposal, ‘Achieving Excellence in higher education in Odisha’ to the Department of Economic Affairs (DAE) of the Finance Department soon so that the State Government would be able to get World Bank assistance of Rs 1019.70 crore for the project.
In a letter to Irani, Patnaik reminded that his Government had submitted a copy of the preliminary project proposal to the HRD Ministry on October 28, 201 and had followed it up with two reminders on December 18, 2015 and January 20, 2016. He said, as requested by the DAE, the State Government had also submitted the ‘Debt Sustainability Certificate’ for the externally aided project.