47 Border Villages In Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri To Be Developed

In Lakhimpur Kheri district, as many as 47 villages sharing borders with Nepal are set to be developed as the first villages on the border under the Centre-sponsored Vibrant Villages Programme II (VVP II). These villages will receive all-weather road and telecommunication connectivity.

Kheri District Magistrate Durga Shakti Nagpal told PTI, "Border security and border development must go hand in hand. Through the VVP II, we are strengthening the infrastructure and livelihood opportunities in these 47 villages, so as to elevate their living standards and to make our frontier communities strong, prosperous, and firmly rooted."

The programme focuses on infrastructure development, border-specific outreach activities, and the creation of improved livelihood opportunities. This includes promoting tourism, preserving cultural heritage, and providing skill development, while also strengthening local self-help groups, co-operative societies, youth, and women, she added.

According to District Statistics Officer (DSTO) Arvind Verma, who spoke to PTI, the 47 border villages include 18 in the Pallia tehsil and 29 in the Nighasan tehsil.

Verma noted that the planning department in Uttar Pradesh will coordinate the implementation of VVP II, which encompasses all border villages in the districts of Balrampur, Shrawasti, Maharajganj, Pilibhit, Bahraich, and Kheri that adjoin Nepal. A district-level committee, chaired by the Kheri district magistrate, has been established to ensure effective implementation of the programme.

In related developments, the UP planning department recently held a video conference with concerned district authorities to discuss projects for rolling out VVP II in the state, officials said.

As per the Ministry of Home Affairs, the government approved VVP-II on April 2, 2025, as a Central Sector Scheme with an outlay of Rs 6,839 crore till FY 2028-29. This supports the vision of Viksit Bharat@2047 for 'Safe, Secured and Vibrant land borders' by enabling comprehensive development of villages in blocks abutting international land borders, excluding those on the northern border already addressed under VVP-I.

The programme will be implemented in select strategic villages across the states/UTs of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Gujarat, J&K (UT), Ladakh (UT), Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Punjab, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Tripura, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal.

It also seeks to achieve saturation in all such villages across four key thematic areas: all-weather road connectivity, telecom connectivity, television connectivity, and electrification, through convergence with existing scheme norms, the ministry stated.

(with PTI inputs)