The cabinet on Tuesday appointed RITES Ltd to prepare a detailed project report (DPR) for the proposed metro rail in the capital.

“The cabinet gave its nod to the urban development and housing department’s proposal to get the DPR prepared through RITES. It sanctioned Rs 2.52 crore as fee to the consultant,” cabinet co-ordination secretary Brajesh Mehtotra said.

Mehrotra said that RITES is a multi-disciplinary consultancy organisation in the fields of transport, infrastructure and related technologies. would prepare the DPR within a period of six months.The DPR is expected to be prepared and submitted to the government by April 2014 and the government would float a global tender for construction work by June 2014.

The urban development minister, Prem Kumar, had announced in the Assembly during the budget session in March that Rs 9 crore had been sanctioned for conducting techno-economic study for metro rail in the city.The cabinet, following a high court directive, decided to give Rs 5,000 per month as financial assistance to two conjoined twins Saba and Farah Sakeel of Patna. The cabinet also gave its approval to the panchayati raj department’s proposal to conduct bypolls for 1,511 posts under rural local bodies. The bypoll would be conducted for posts of members of zila parishad, panchayat samiti, sarpanch, mukhiya, gram kutchery member and gram panchayat member.

The secretary said bypolls would be held on July 7 in 36 districts, while the poll would be held on July 24 in Saran and Siwan.

The cabinet also sanctioned Rs 170.14 crore as loan to Bihar State Power (Holding) Company Ltd for installation of electric meters. The cabinet sanctioned Rs 102 crore as loan to the power company to be spent in the current fiscal. It also sanctioned Rs 49.04 crore to purchase 17 transformers for capacity augmentation of 14 grid sub-stations in the state, the secretary said, adding that the government sanctioned Rs 20 crore as loan to the power company to execute the work in the current fiscal.

The cabinet also sanctioned Rs 2,100 crore as its share in the centrally sponsored Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan for 2013-14, Mehrotra said, adding the government would release its share after state receives its the central share,.