No clear indication in PM's special package announcement of where funds will come from: Pondy CM

The Prime Minister's announcement has evoked both appreciation and confusion among the people, he said.

"There is no clear indication on where the finance will be available, what the schemes are that will be covered under the package and who the beneficiaries will be," he told reporters at his daily news briefing.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in a televised address to the nation on Tuesday, had announced Rs 20 lakh crore stimulus package to revive the economy, which combined the government's recent announcements on supporting key sectors as also measures rolled out by the Reserve Bank of India.

Narayanasamy said the government had found that MGNREGA was an effective panacea to prevent starvation in rural areas.

Not less than 18,000 farm labourers were getting jobs under the MGNREA for development of infrastructure, desilting of water bodies and other activities, enabling them to keep the home fires burning and prevent starvation.

"The number of rural workers will increase in course of time", he claimed.

He said the Centre should make it clear what schemes were evolved to end unemployment caused during the lockdown.

Narayanaswamy said the tourism sector had borne the impact of the lockdown across the country with several people engaged in the sector facing a crisis.

As far as Puducherry was concerned, the government was concentrating on economic development and also preventing spread of COVID-19 through several measures, particularly by sealing the border points.

He said the government would forward a report to the Centre on May 15 with its views on extension of lockdown and relaxation of curbs when current one ends on May 17.

"Our concern is that Puducherry should not offer scope for the pandemic to spread, particularly with the neighbouring districts of Villupuram and Cuddalore registering increase in occurrence of the infection', he said and sought the cooperation of the people in this regard.