Ap May Get Ibrd Credit

The World Bank has in principle accepted Andhra Pradeshs request for credit of Rs 8,000 crore for infrastructure development and financial restructuring. Announcing this at yesterdays investment conference here, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu said the modalities of the loan are being worked out and it will be finalised soon.

He said this is the first time the World Bank has offered such a credit line to one of the states. The loan will be for a three-year period.

Naidu also announced that an Infrastructure Initiative Fund with a corpus of $20 million will soon be set up in the state.

The government will provide $2 million as seed money while national and international agencies like Infrastructure Development Corporation, ILFS, the Asian Development Bank, IFCI and the World Bank are being requested to participate in the constitution of the fund.

The fund will finance pre-feasibility and detailed feasibility reports of infrastructure projects, develop expeditious and transparent bidding procedures and evaluate and award projects.