Andhra Pradesh spent Rs 73,000 crore for education sector

Kakinada: Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy said on Friday that the state government has introduced revolutionary reforms in several sectors like education, healthcare, agriculture and administration in the past 55 months of the YSRC rule.

This helped provide quality education, quality medical care and good governance to the people. A total of Rs 73,000 crore was spent in the education sector with the aim of providing quality education to students. "Education is the future of the student as well as the state and the country," the CM asserted.

He said, "Many online courses have been introduced to empower students digitally and enhance their employability. Artificial Intelligence courses are being linked to all courses."

Jagan Reddy was addressing a gathering after he launched the Jagananna Vidya Deevena  scheme by releasing Rs 584 crore to the accounts of 8.09 lakh students for the third quarter of this academic year, at the event in Bhimavaram in West Godavari district.

He said every year, once every three months, full fee reimbursement amounts are being credited into the accounts of mothers of the beneficiary students.

In order not to give trouble to the final year students, the government has credited fee reimbursement amounts to two lakh final year students, the chief minister said.

He said that a total of Rs 11,900 crore for 27.61 lakh students has been released from the Vidya Deevena scheme for the past four and half years. Under the Vidya Vasathi scheme, Rs 4,275 crore would be credited to



provide boarding and lodging expenses to the students.

Jagan Reddy wished the poor students to study hard and emerge as doctors, engineers etc that would altogether change lifestyles through good education.

He said the previous government owed Rs 1,700 crore under the fees reimbursement schemes and these arrears were cleared by the YSRC government.

Jagan Reddy said the entire curriculum has been changed for all the classes to ensure employability for the students. The government introduced CBSE syllabus and prepared bilingual text books.

He said that to provide technical education to all the students, Artificial Intelligence courses were introduced in all the degree classes. The government tied up 350 international colleges for this purpose and the students can do online courses in 21 faculties of these prestigious colleges.

These students would be given certificates in the respective subjects along with their regular course certificates in February.

The Jagananna Videshi Vidya scheme would fund the education for AP students in international universities like Harvard etc. "For students who get seats in those universities, the state government would bear the entire fees ranging from Rs 50 lakh to 1.20 crore," he said.

The CM praised Bhimavaram MLA Grandhi Srinivas for the development works done in the constituency. He promised to sanction funds for this purpose. West Godavari collector Prashanthi and several other dignitaries were present.