Cabinet okays schemes worth ₹1,70,580 crore

A week after it cleared schemes worth 1.02 lakh crore, the union cabinet on approved Wednesday schemes related to agriculture, tribal welfare, space research and exploration, fertilisers, media and biotechnology research worth over ₹1,70,580 crore.

- Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

The biggest of the nine schemes, for which approvals were accorded by the cabinet, at a meeting chaired by prime minister Narendra Modi, was the Pradhan Mantri Janjatiya Unnat Gram Abhiyan for which an outlay of ₹79,156 crore has been provided to improve the socio-economic condition of tribals. The scheme will cover 63,000 villages benefiting over 5 crore tribals, who number around 10.45 crore as per 2011 census.

The cabinet also approved the continuation of Pradhan Mantri Annadata Aay Sanrakshan Abhiyan (PMAASHA) schemes and brought the price support scheme (PSS) and price stabilisation fund (PSF) under it to "provide remunerative prices to farmers and to control price volatility of essential commodities for consumers".

For the purpose, it has approved a total financial outgo of 35,000 crore during 15th finance commission cycle till 2025-26.