Hyderabad, May 8 : Telangana Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka said on Thursday that the state government is committed to implementing welfare schemes despite financial distress.

In his remarks at a programme to lay the foundation stone for a medical college at Khammam, Vikramarka, who is also the Finance Minister, said despite the debt burden and financial distress, the Congress government is committed to continuing welfare schemes.

The government is spending Rs 6,500 crore every month to repay the debts of Rs 7 lakh crore raised by the previous government of Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), he noted.

The Deputy Chief Minister said that despite the challenges, the government is paying salaries to employees on the first of every month. "Under BRS, the employees were getting salary on the 15th or 20th, but for the last 15 months, we have been paying salaries on the first of every month," he said.

He assured the employees that the government would address their demands in the future. "The Chief Minister said the same thing, but his comments were distorted by BRS and BJP," he said while defending Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy's recent remarks on the demands of the government employees.

Vikramarka pointed out that the Congress had promised an additional welfare scheme worth Rs. 60,000 crore to 70,000 crore.

He alleged that the previous government had completely neglected the health sector. He said the BRS spent only Rs 5,950 crore on health in 10 years, while the Congress government spent Rs 11,482 crores in a single year. The government is already trying to clear pending health bills.

The medical college will come up on 35 acres at a cost of Rs 166 crore.

Minister for Health Damodar Raja Narasimha claimed that the government is working to strengthen the healthcare system by sanctioning more primary health centres.

He said the government was focusing on Warangal, Karimnagar and Khammam districts so that people of this region don't have to depend on Hyderabad for superspeciality services.

He said a regional cancer hospital was being set up in Warangal at a cost of Rs 30-35 crore. The government has also sanctioned an organ retrieval centre for Khammam.

The Health Minister said that Non-Communicable Diseases were a major area of focus for the government. As part of this, a mobile cancer screening unit has been sanctioned for every district.

Stating that 213 new ambulances were inaugurated recently to bring down emergency response time from 18 to 14 minutes, he said that the state needs 100 more ambulances to cut down the time to 11 minutes.

He also announced sanctioning a nursing college for the Khammam district.

Agriculture Minister Tummala Nageswara Rao and Revenue Minister P. Srinivas Reddy were also present on the occasion.

/IANS