Patna, March 8: Chief minister Nitish Kumar today termed the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana as a “faulty scheme” and suggested the scheme should be revamped.

Nitish, while speaking during the Question Hour in the Legislative Council, said: “The Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana is a faulty scheme and I have been raising the issue since 2006. I have also discussed it with the Prime Minister, Union energy minister, vice-chairman of planning commission and have tried to persuade them to revamp the scheme to make it successful.”

The chief ministers called the low-capacity transformers of 16KVA and 25KVA being used under the yojana tullu transformers which can’t take much load. “The state has thousands of burnt transformers due to a faulty scheme that needs to be changed,” Nitish said, suggesting the scheme should incorporate the provision of installing either 63KVA or 100KVA transformers.

Water budget

The Bihar Legislative Assembly today passed a Rs 2,916-crore budget for the water resources department.

Presenting the budget, water resources minister Vijay Kumar Chaudhary said the state government is committed to improving the agriculture output and this can happen only if the irrigation facilities in the state are strengthened.