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Returning home after a 10-day sojourn to the United Kingdom, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has suddenly woken up to the need for restarting distribution of laptops to young college going students of the state.
While the chief minister personally gave away some 79,000 laptops in fulfillment of his 2012 election promise to young boys and girls clearing Class XII , the subsequent distribution events could not be organised because of his busy schedule.
Consequently, some 4.4 lakh laptops were gathering dust in the UP government warehouses, even as Hewlett Packard -- the only company that had agreed to meet the state government’s demand for 15 lakh laptops -- was awaiting its payment for the initial deliveries.
“The distribution of laptops will be resumed very soon,” Akhilesh told anxious mediapersons in his first interface with reporters on Monday, after his return from the family holiday.
When a scribe drew his attention to reports about UP government sitting over payments against the laptops already supplied, he promptly sought to pass the blame to his bureaucracy. “It is the job of officials to ensure the payments; I will look into it,” he added.
According to sources, the chief minister took certain officials to task for sitting over the payments for something that was truly close to his heart. With eye of the youth vote, he made specific budgetary provisions for earmarking Rs. 2721.24 crores for distribution of free laptops to students clearing Class XII and tablets to those clearing Class X.
Meanwhile, with a view to keeping its commitment, Hewett-Packard continued to ensure its deliveries ion schedule, thereby ending up stacking over 4.4 lakh laptops worth over Rs 830 crore still lie in government warehouses actross the state. In some of the districts, the packing even got exposed to rain.
So far, the company has delivered 5,19,600 laptops, costing about Rs 998.41 crore, according to top official, who admitted that under the terms of the contract signed with HP, the state government was required to shell out 90 per cent of the payment at the time of delivery.
While 5 per cent would be paid after the company finishes conducting the training and demonstration to teachers and students at tehsil or school levels, the final 5 per cent would be paid after a one-year maintenance period.
Of the proposed 15 lakh laptops and 25 lakh tablets to be given away, only 79,491 laptops have been handed over to the target beneficiaries at various functions specially organised by the government.
HP has also created an additional inventory of 1,41,866 laptops that can be made available to the state government immediately once a purchase order is issued. Of the budgetary provision of Rs. 2721.24 crore, a sum of Rs. 400 crore has been set aside for tablets, whose distribution has yet to commence.
Since the promise of laptops and tablets went a long way in getting Akhilesh’s Samajwadi Party the long lead over all other political rivals at the 2012 state assembly elections, the chief minister is keen to ensure not only timely payment to the supplier, but also plans to speed up the distribution part.
Realising the magnitude of the task as well as the vote potential of the “gift”, the chief minister now proposes to depute some of the senior ministers to help him speed up the distribution ritual in different parts of the state.
“I will try and give away the laptops wherever it is possible; otherwise I will ask some of my cabinet colleagues to undertake the task, in order to ensure early fulfillment of our promise to the youth of the state,” he emphasised.