Hyderabad, Oct 19th: A new scheme of setting up 1,000 polytechnics across the country has been approved by the Centre to create more job opportunities for youth and arrest migration of rural youth to urban areas in search of jobs, Union Minister of State for Planning and Parliamentary Affairs V Narayanasamy said. Inaugurating the first National Convention of rural institutes organized by the National Council of Rural Institutes (NCRI), he said the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance Government was committed to provision of urban facilities in Rural Areas (PURA) propagated by former President A P J Abdul Kalam.

He said under the National Mission on Education, internet connectivity would be provided to 20,000 colleges and 10,000 departments in universities at a cost of Rs 5,000 crore in the next three years. The Union Government also planned to set up 2.50 lakh common service centers across the country, he added. He urged the NCRI to promote at least one rural university in each of the clusters of backward and interior rural and tribal areas of the country.

Noting that wherever local bodies were active and functioned well, the implementation of rural developmental programs was much better, he stressed the need for developing skills of Panchayat Raj Institutions in designing, planning, monitoring and implementation of these programs. The UPA Government's agenda was to transform India into a ''superpower of peace and inclusive prosperity in 21st century.'' Referring to the Center’s decision to restructure the Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana and convert it into a national Rural Livelihoods Mission, he said a multi-pronged strategy would be adopted for poverty reduction in a time-bound manner by providing sustainable livelihood through various means to rural people below poverty line.