Chandy confident of good ties with Centre

Ahead of his meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday, Kerala chief minister Oommen Chandy said he was confident of a good working relationship with the Centre regardless of political differences to take forward the development of the state.

"Though it will be a courtesy call, development issues relating to the state will broadly figure during the meeting," said Chandy, whose current tenure as chief minister has two more year to go.

Asked what are the key issues of development to be taken up with the Centre, Chandy, who did not attend the installation of the new government, said "let us see what their priorities are and that would also be factored in while working out the state's projects."

Chandy had earlier made it clear the UDF government was not for any confrontation with the new government at the Centre even though they have political differences. Looking back to the last three years, Chandy expressed satisfaction about the performance of the government based on the plank 'Development and Care', which gave equal emphasis to infrastructure development and welfare of the people, especially the less privileged.

The Congress-led UDF government will come out with more support to help business and technological ventures, enthused by the good response a youth entrepreneurship programme in Start-up Village at Kochi Infopark has received.

"For the last few decades, the aspiration of a Keralite youth had been a job or a visa. This mindset started changing with more and more graduates and technically skilled youth looking for opportunities to do things by themselves. They have ideas and acumen to execute their ideas. All that they require is an initial support from government and state agencies," Chandy said.

Chandy said the state government would give added emphasis and budgetary support to promote such businesses and technological ventures. Already, 200 units have come up at the Startup Village at the Infopark and more than 1,000 ideas are still waiting to take-off, he said.

As a policy, the government had set apart one per cent of the budget for all departments for Youth entrepreneurship, which together stood at around Rs 500 crore. This will be enhanced further and all the departments had been asked to submit their views, he said.