A preliminary discussion took place between the representatives of the World Bank and those of the commissioner of municipal administration Premchand recently and another round of discussion will take place in two months’ time. The fresh loan will be in addition to the Rs 1,431-crore loan, for which an MOU was signed with the World Bank by Chief Minister K Rosaiah in January this year.

``The World Bank has selected six States in the country to offer loan for decongestion of traffic and Andhra Pradesh is one of them,’’ said Principal Secretary (MAUD) TS Appa Rao.

He said that preliminary discussions on the fresh loan were held in Delhi two months ago and another meeting took place recently.

A third round of talks will be held in two months’ time and the projects under the agreement will be finalised by the end of the year.

According to municipal administration and Urban development (MAUD) officials, the World Bank was impressed by the programmes being taken up under the Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM ) and came forward to lend Rs 1,000 crore.

While the loan agreement, which has been signed already, will cover civic amenities like supply of drinking water and sanitation, the fresh loan is meant for improvement of traffic conditions in the cities.

The officials say the loan will obviously benefit the big cities in the State which are experiencing traffic congestion due to narrow roads and increase in the population, and lack of innovative approaches to ease the problem. The fresh loan offer will make MAUD officials think hard on innovative measures to meet the objectives.

The World Bank wants new and innovative ideas rather than traditional methods of widening roads and constructing road overbridges.

States which would come up with innovative ideas will clinch the loan and the State has to compete with them. The loan will be repaid by the Government of India and the State Government will get it as a grant.