Jaipur: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said that the Centre will set up 31 universities, eight IITs and seven IIMs as part of its efforts to promote higher education in the country.

“Besides, 20 regional engineering, five Indian Science Institutes, two planning and structural colleges, 10 NITs and 1000 polytechnics will be established,” he said.

“The Centre has given a high emphasis on education through schemes like Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan but the state government is not serious about its implementation,” he said.

“Under the Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Mission, the Centre had provided a grant of Rs1700 crore to the state government for development projects in two cities including Jaipur, but the city has witnessed no major improvement,” the prime minister said.

“The Congress-led UPA government has introduced several schemes like Rural Health Mission and Insurance, social security, old age pension, crop loan waivers and the NREGY scheme,” he said.

However, Singh alleged that the state failed to implement in toto the NREGY scheme, under which 100 days of employment was guaranteed to rural people.

“I am told that the BJP government in Rajasthan is not working for welfare of poor but spending money on unplanned things like buying planes, helicopters and cars,” he said.

“The BJP government in the state promised 24 hours domestic and eight hours of agricultural power supply, unfortunately it remained as promises,” he alleged, while urging people to vote for Congress in the upcoming assembly polls in the state on 4 December.