SHILLONG, Dec 20: Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma has sought more than Rs 1.5 lakh crore from the Centre to address the critical development needs of Meghalaya. The allocation was sought in a memorandum that Sangma submitted to Union Finance Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman during the pre-budget consultations held in Jaisalmer, Rajasthan on Friday.
These requests are designed to enhance infrastructure, promote digital services, support rural livelihoods, and improve financial inclusion in Meghalaya.
Sangma underscored the state’s pressing developmental needs and aspirations. He said the Finance Ministry can play a pivotal role in transforming Meghalaya’s socio-economic landscape by addressing a few key areas. These include continuing with the SASCI funding, creating special allocations for the northeastern states, establishing digital service centres, supporting village organizations, enhancing financial inclusion, and strengthening digital literacy.
He said these initiatives are essential for ensuring that every citizen in Meghalaya has access to critical services and opportunities for growth as part of India’s broader development agenda.
The Chief Minister emphasised the importance of continuing and augmenting the Special Assistance to States for Capital Investment (SASCI) scheme, requesting an allocation of more than Rs 1.5 lakh crore for the 2025-26 fiscal.
The SASCI scheme has been instrumental in enabling states, particularly those in the Northeast, to undertake vital capital projects that stimulate economic growth and improve citizens’ quality of life. The meritocratic approach of the scheme rewards states for implementing reforms and effectively utilising funds within the fiscal year.
Sangma said Meghalaya leveraged this initiative to bridge resource gaps and enhance connectivity, making it essential for the Finance Ministry to strengthen this programme further.
Recognising the unique challenges faced by the northeastern states, he proposed a special allocation of Rs 10,000 crore within the SASCI scheme specifically for seven states of the region (excluding Assam). The region’s geographical barriers lead to significantly higher infrastructure costs — between 35% and 50%, more than other regions — which hamper development efforts.
Despite their special status and funding ratios, these states receive minimal investments in national projects and have limited access to private capital. The proposed allocation aims to empower these states to become equal partners in India’s growth narrative and improve their human development indicators.
To address the digital service delivery challenges in Meghalaya, Sangma proposed establishing 1,000 Citizen Digital Service Delivery Centres (CDSDCs) across the state.
These centres, he said, will provide citizens with access to essential government services such as welfare programmes, banking services, healthcare, and education in remote areas where digital literacy is low. The initiative aims to bridge the digital divide by promoting digital literacy and ensuring that even the most marginalized communities can benefit from government services.
Each centre will facilitate training programmes to empower citizens with necessary digital skills, he said.
With the growing number of village organisations (VOs) in Meghalaya, many women self-help groups (SHGs) members are forging ahead to expand their businesses. “To provide them with a safe working space and boost their entrepreneurial efforts, we propose leveraging the SASCI scheme to receive financial assistance for constructing 1,000 VO service delivery centres across the state,” Sangma said.
“We urge the Ministry of Finance to consider this proposal for inclusion under the SASCI scheme funding, as an extension of the ‘Working Women Hostels’ initiative, to empower rural women in Meghalaya to actively contribute to the state’s economic growth,” he added.
To ensure that banking services reach the rural areas of Meghalaya, the CM urged the ministry to establish one-man rural branches of the banks to ensure better service delivery.
He also suggested a guideline to encourage the banks to double their rural branch numbers to bridge the bank deficit in the hilly areas and financial assistance for the same may be provided in the form of viability gap funding (VGF) or additional assistance from the Financial Inclusion Fund (FIF).
In the memorandum, the CM highlighted schemes such as AMRUT and AMRUT 2.0, which aimed at providing basic urban infrastructure, have had limited impact in Meghalaya. Despite removing the 1 lakh population criterion, AMRUT 2.0’s allocation to the northeastern region (NER) remains low at 2.68% of the total Rs 66,750 crore funds, which drops to 1.52% if Assam is excluded.
“To address these disparities, the state proposes increasing AMRUT allocation in this year’s Budget and introducing a dedicated Budget for NER and hilly cities to address their distinct infrastructure challenges and meet their urban development needs,” he said.
Meanwhile, Meghalaya proposed a 50-50 cost-sharing mechanism for operation and maintenance expenses under the Jal Jeevan Mission for the first 2-3 years, recognising the state’s unique socio-economic and geographical challenges.
This collaborative approach will enable the state to overcome its operation and maintenance challenges, ensuring the long-term sustainability of the mission. The key benefits of this support include ensuring equity by alleviating the financial burden on the state, safeguarding investments made in water supply infrastructure, and promoting sustainability by empowering communities to take ownership of their water supply systems.
Sangma said that with central assistance, Meghalaya can make significant strides in improving the lives of its rural population, aligning with the mission’s objective of providing tap water connections to every rural household by 2024.
At the same time, the state aims to boost the performance of women-led micro-enterprises and expand their economic opportunities with the support of the Lakhpati Didi initiative. To achieve this, the state proposes increasing the loan ceiling from Rs 3 lakh to Rs 5 lakh to support the expansion of existing businesses run by SHG members.
Additionally, the state suggested introducing an additional 3% interest subvention on prompt loan repayments to encourage more SHGs to avail of loans, aligning with the Kisan Credit Card (KCC) framework.
