ASSAM

Assam: GIS mapping to find closer exam center

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The Assam Higher Secondary Education Council (AHSEC) has launched GIS mapping of schools and examination centres to minimise travel distance for students.

Students would be allocated centres closer to their schools based on the mapping. Students in hilly terrains and the riverine belt of Assam have been facing difficulties commuting long distances to reach centres for their board examination.

All 1,784 institutions affiliated to it, including higher secondary schools, degree colleges and erstwhile junior colleges (now known as senior secondary schools), have been asked to complete geo-tagging at the earliest.

TheAssam governmentwill notreopen schoolsunless theCovid positivity ratedips below two per cent across all districts, thestate education departmentsaid.

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The newSOPpublished by the Assam State Disaster Management Authority directed alleducationinstitutions, including schools, colleges and universities, to continue to provide qualityvirtualoptions and said there would be no in-person classes. Online Education amid a lingering second wave has posed a big hurdle for students from underprivileged backgrounds as they are not able to afford the necessary .

The positivity rate of the state in the last seven days (from July 20 to July 26) has been 1.24%. Though most of the districts are maintaining below two per cent positivity, in the hill districts of Dima Hasao and West Karbi Anglong, its still 5.27% and 2.13% respectively. In five other districts, the positivity rate is hovering between 1.50 and 1.99%. These are Dhemaji (1.62%), Golaghat (1.94%), Kamrup (1.79%), Karbi Anglong (1.50%) and Nalbari (1.73%). During the seven days, 10,939 cases were positive.

Assam govt signs MoU with Caspian Impact Investment Adviser

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Assam Rural and Agricultural Services (ARIAS) Society, an autonomous body under the Assam government signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Caspian Impact Investment Adviser Pvt. Ltd. (Caspian Equity), a Venture Capital institution that invests in social impact enterprises.

This collaboration marks a significant milestone in the pursuit of strengthening rural infrastructure and fostering agricultural productivity in Assam.
Under the PARTNERSHIP, ARIAS will be the nodal agency for establishing and implementing a contributory and determinate investment trust — theAssam Agribusiness Investment Fund(AAIF).

ARIAS is designated as the anchor investor for the AAIF, which will be managed by Caspian Equity as the fund manager.

With a corpus of Rs 250 crore, AAIF is a unique sector-specific fund through a State Government in India, focusing on boosting agricultural productivity and EMPLOYMENT generation in the state. It will mainly invest in small and medium enterprises in the agribusiness and allied sectors to achieve accelerated Growth.

Assam Baibhav Award Awarded To Ratan Tata

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Ratan Tata received Assam’s highest civilian award, the ‘Assam Baibhav,’ on 24 January.

Highlights:

Ratan Tata can’t attend the function personally owing to the Covid-19 crisis. His representative accepted the award during a ceremony in Guwahati.

Himanta Biswa Sarma, the Chief Minister of Assam, said on January 23 that the Assam Baibhav, Assam Saurav, and Assam Gaurav Awards would be conferred for the year 2021.

Professor Dipak Chand Jain, Lovlina Borgohain, Professor Kamalendu Deb Krori, Dr. Lakshmanan S, and Neel Pawan Baruah received the Assam Saurav prize.

Manoj Kumar Basumatary, Munindra Nath Ngatey, Dharanidhar Boro, Hemoprabha Chutia, Dr. Basanta Hazarika, Kaushik Baruah, Khorsing Terang, Akash Jyoti Gogoi, Namita Kalita, Dr. Asif Iqbal, Kalpana Boro, Boby Hazarika, and Bormita Momin received the Assam Gaurav award.

On the occasion of “Asom diwas,” it was declared (Assam Day). The prize for the award is Rs 5 lakh.

Furthermore, the recipient will be eligible for government-funded medical treatment for the rest of his life.

IIT-G makes low-cost, recyclable solar cells

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TheIndian Institute of Technology Guwahati(IIT-G) researchers have developed cost-effective, highly efficient perovskite solar cells (PSCs) to produce electricity from sunlight that can have over 21% power conversion efficiency about 5% more than conventional solar panels.
This cutting-edge technology in emerging perovskite-based semiconducting devices, developed by the team, is considered the most promising due to their low-cost, ease of manufacturing as roll-to-roll devices, high material availability and easy recyclability.

The hybrid perovskite-based solar or photovoltaic devices are easy to manufacture and easily recyclable were developed by achieving significant power conversion efficiencies by utilizing economical solution-based photovoltaic device processing techniques even at mild room temperature and obtaining high ambient, thermal and optical stability that can be easily achievable in northeast-like Environment. The Centre has recently given a push to semiconductor manufacturing in the country, which can be a big boost for this new kind of solar cells.

Assam to build 2,000 anganwadi centres for Rs 500 croreThe Assam Cabinet approved Rs 500 crore to construct 2,000 new Anganwadi centres across the state, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said. According to the cabinet decisions shared on Sarma’s official Twitter handle, the Anganwadi centres will be constructed in rural areas in order to improve child care services.

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The cost of each centre will be Rs 25 lakh and the total cost of all the centres will be Rs 500 crore.

To boost the handloom sector, administrative approval was granted to set up the College of Sericulture at Titabar in Jorhat at an expenditure of Rs 22.41 crore

Black rice cultivation brings hope to Assams tribal farmers

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Blackricevarieties brought from Manipur and Odisha toAssamhave infused new hope among tribal farmers in Goalpara district of Assam.

Veteran farmerUpendra Rabhafrom Goalpara, known for popularizing the black rice variety in lower Assam has been roped in by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) to promote the premium varieties of black rice that have the potential to give international market linkage to the farmers of Assam. Ravaged by elephants every year, the black rice varieties have been planted under the -supported Assam Agribusiness and Rural Transformation Project (APART), implemented by the state agricultural department. This aims to give relief to the farmers with high returns even from lesser yield.

Branded under the name,Upendra RiceI, the variety has already been supplied to the markets of Odisha, Punjab, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand and West Bengal. Rabha received one kg black rice seed sample from a Rajasthan agricultural fair through theKrishi Vigyan Kendra, Goalpara, several years back but only one seed germinated. He did not lose hope. From one seed, the variety later became the popular Upendra Rice I and it has spread to several districts of Assam, Rabha said. This year, he claimed Upendra Rice II and III, evolved from Upendra Rice I, have been distributed to local farmers.

The seeds were sown on a total area of 17.6 bighas of land comprising Manipuri black rice on 10 bigha, Kalavati on 3.6 bigha and Kalamalifula on 4.0 bigha. The crop is expected to be harvested in the next one week.

TheAssamgovernments eviction in Darrang district as part of its drive against encroachments on Monday, which left 800 families homeless, has drawn sharp criticism from the OppositionCongressand AIUDF.

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The All Assam Minorities Students Union (Aamsu), an influential students body representing both religious and linguistic minorities, also formed a human chain demanding immediate rehabilitation.

Assam chief ministerHimanta Biswa Sarmasaid the eviction is aimed at starting community farming as part of its drive against encroachments.

Assam signs MoU with MFIs for relief to women borrowers

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TheAssam government signed an MoU with 37 MFIs to provide financial relief to several lakh poor Women borrowers in the state to help them maintain good credit discipline in Covid times by expending over Rs 7,000 crore to the lenders.

The MoU will remain in force till March 31, 2023. In the last election, BJPs biggest promise was to these women borrowers that after coming to power, the government will waive off their dues to the MFIs.

Till June this year, there were 14 lakh women microfinance borrowers in the state of which about 11 lakh have either made regular repayments or whose payments are overdue, but are not marked asnon-performing assets(NPA). To these categories of borrowers, the government will pay a one-time incentive up to Rs 25,000 to incentivize such credit discipline.

The finance department of the Government of Assam signed an MOU with microfinance institutions for implementation of Assam Micro Finance Incentive and Relief Scheme (AMFIRS), 2021 to provide succour to poor women borrowers who are not able to return the loan amount of microfinance institutions.