ASSAM

The BJP-ledAssamgovernment has decided to set up an expert committe to examine whether polygamy can be banned in the state by a legislation to provide a major push for empowering Women as it steps into its third year.

Chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, on theeveof completion of second year in office, on Tuesday said the prevalence of the practice of polygamy, both formal and informal, was found to be high during the crackdown on child marriages since January last.

Polygamy is generally prohibited in all religious communities in India, except the Muslim community. Practising polygamy is an offence punishable under Section 494 and 495 of the IPC, except for the Muslim community, where Section 2 of the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act, 1937 governs the law pertaining to marriage which allows it.

The Assam government has decided to form an expert committee to examine whether the is empowered to prohibit polygamy in the state. The committee will examine the provisions of the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Act, 1937 read with Article 25 of the Constitution of India, in relation to the directive principle of state policy for a Uniform Civil Code (UCC).

The tea in Assam is apprehensive of losing 10-15% of the crop during March and April due to drought-like situation and hailstorms.

In January and February this year, Assam harvested only 0.23 million kg compared to 0.27 million kg in 2020 and 0.44 million kg the year before. While the crop figure for March is yet to be released by the Tea Board, the figure is expected to be lower by 10-15% in March and April 2021 as compared to 2019, Bhattacharjee said, adding that tea bushes needed rainfall during summer so that production of tea leaves remained steady till the arrival of monsoon.

Assam received paltry rainfall in March and April, directly affecting its yield. Assam valley has received only 14.2 mm of rainfall during January and February as against 28.47 mm in 2020. Similarly, Cachar has received only 4.15 mm rainfall as against 8.3 mm last year during the same period.

About 10.5% of Assams total tea production which was 618.35 million kg last year is recorded during March and April. The state produces about 4.5% of its total crop in March and around 6% in April, which is about 32 million kg and 44 million kg, respectively.

Minority strongholds inBarpetaseem more concerned abouthealth,educationand development than Citizenship issues.

Thousands of people were excluded from the NRC, the updated version of which was published in August 2019 in Baghbar, Jania and Chenga constituencies in Barpeta. This district has been the nervecentre of political andintellectual activismof the minority community in lowerAssam.

The movement against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act too gained widespread support in this region, where the Muslims were up in arms against the legislation to regularize the entry of non-Muslims from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Even though some intellectuals in the area feel that citizenship questions will be the deciding factor in this election, others see the polls in a different Light.

The countrys biggest “detention centre”, now renamed “transit camp” for a human touch at Matia in lowerAssamsGoalparadistrict, has become operational with the first batch of inmates being shifted to the newly built facility from another transit camp at the Goalpara district jail on Friday. The transit camp was built at a cost of around Rs 64 crore.

Official sources in the prison department said that altogether there are around 219 “declared foreigners” lodged in all the transit camps in Assam, including the standalone transit camp in Matia. Before the Matia centre became operational, all the inmates were being kept in these six jails. The detention centres, which housed people declared foreigners by foreigners , quasi-judicial bodies, were renamed transit camps in 2021.

The 29th biennial conference ofBarakUpatyakaBanga SahityaOSanskriti Sammelan, an apex literary and cultural organisation, will highlight the demand for ensuring economic autonomy ofAssamsBarak Valley. The three-day biennial conference will be held in Silchar from March 11.

The government has announced the Act East Policy in 2014, the upgrade of the Look East Policy. The Barak Valley region is the gateway to a number of south-Asian countries. However, the government is yet to make its programme clear about how the geographical and Communication advantage of this region will be used to implement the Act East Policy.

The Assam Power Distribution Company Limited (APDCL) has petitioned the Assam Electricity Regulatory Commission (AERC) for a hike of Rs 1.25 per unit and the fixed charge by Rs 15 in power tariff with effect from April 1 for the period 2023-24 to meet its requirement of around Rs 10,000 crore, which would hit hard households that form around 93% of the companys consumer base.

According to the proposals, the tariff (which is a combination of fixed charges and variable charges) will shoot up by a minimum Rs 25.55 for Jeevan Dhara category for every kilowatt consumed per hour.

The company, which did not propose any change in the tariff for three categories of consumers electric vehicles charging stations, electric crematorium and RAILWAY traction last year, has proposed an increase of Rs 15 in fixed charges for the crematoriums and vehicle-charging stations and Rs 35 for the railway traction. It has proposed an increase of Re 1 in variable charges for crematoriums and vehicle-charging stations and Rs 1.5 for railway traction.

day after finance ministerNirmala Sitharamanpresented the Union Budget for 2022-23 in Parliament,Assamcabinet on Wednesday approved setting up a high level task force to oversee the proper implementation ofPM Gati Shaktiplan,” which is a transformative approach for economic Growth and .

The approach is driven by seven enginesroads, railways, Airports, Ports, mass transport, waterways, and Logistics Infrastructure, which will pull forward the economy in unison and will be supported by the complementary roles of energy transmission, IT Communication, bulk water and sewerage, and social infrastructure.

The approach will be powered by Clean Energy and Sabka Prayas with the efforts from the Central Government, the state governments, and the private sector together leading to huge job and entrepreneurial opportunities for all, especially the youth.

To begin with, the PM GatiShakti master plan for expressways will be formulated in 2022-23 to facilitate faster movement of people and goods. Sitharman has announced in her speech that the national highways Network will be expanded by 25,000 km in 2022-23 and Rs 20,000 crore will be mobilized through innovative ways of financing to complement the public Resources.
The cabinet also sanctioned Rs 958 crore for upgrading 114 road-cum-embankments and construction of six rural bridges and Rs 11,031 crore to improve and upgrade vital road projects in the state.

The cabinet further sanctioned Rs 156 crore for acquisition of over 124 bigha private land to facilitate expansion of Jorhat (Rowriah) airport by Airports Authority of India.

HIV cases have spiraled inAssamwith over 2,000 cases being detected in barely seven months this year, a figure which equals the number of cases detected in the entire period in 2021-2022. Health officials said the trend is heading towards a figure which may end up as the highest HIV cases in Assam by March next year.
Till now, the highest ever HIV cases 2,366 were detected in Assam in 2021-2022. But this year, from April to October alone 2,269 cases have been detected.

The new HIV cases in Assam have increased by 26.2% in 2021 in comparison to 2010. In the current year, it is seen that HIV infections are spreading among the youth, especially among IDUs (Injecting Drug Users),

As per NACO HIV Estimation Report 2021, Assam has about 25,073 people living with HIV (PLHIV). Of them, 45% are female and 3% are children. Kamrup (M) has the maximum number of cases (7,610), followed by Cachar district (5,200), Nagaon (1,602) district and Dibrugarh (1,402). Till October 2022, 10,765 people were on anti-retroviral therapy (ART).

The main cause ofHIVinfection in the state is sexual (86.31%), while transmission through infected syringes and needles is merely 5.24%, revealed data released by theAssamState Aids Control Society (AACS) on World Aids Day.

The route of transmission in 82.20% detected HIV positive cases is heterosexual, whereas in 4.11% cases the transmission is by homosexuals or bisexuals. Parent to child infection rate is 4.64%, and in 2.82% cases the reason behind the transmission has not been specified or remains unknown.

The obvious concern has been the areas in and around Guwahati. District wise detection shows that, the maximum number of cases (33%) has been diagnosed in Kamrup (Metropolitan) district as on October 31. Also in the scanner is Cachar district in South Assam where 23% of the state’s total cases have been diagnosed. The National AIDS Control Programme (NACP) data shows that Assam has been able to test 67,15,121 persons (22,22,527 general clients and 44,92,594 pregnant Women) till October 31, 2021 and 20,841 cases have been diagnosed as HIV positive, out of which 19,030 are general clients and 1,811 are pregnant women.

In the last 20 years though, the HIV case detection graph has been unevenly on the rise and reached climax in 2019-20 when the highest 1,955 number of cases. In the last two years, however, it has noticeably gone down to 1,288 in 2020-21 and 1,287 in 2021-22 (April to October).

Expert analysis done by ASACS stated that Assam remains a highly vulnerable state as far as HIV transmission possibility is concerned because a large number of young Population from the state is also going to large cities for EMPLOYMENT and get involved in high-risk behaviour. A large number of female migrants from other northeastern states, West Bengal and Nepal, who have come to Assam for employment and Education, got involved in risk behavior favorable for HIV transmission, they observed.

According to India HIV estimations 2019, adult (15 to 49 years) prevalence Percentage in northeast was highest in Mizoram (2.32%), followed by Nagaland (1.45%), Manipur (1.18%), Meghalaya (0.54%), Tripura (0.10%), Assam (0.09%),(0.07%) and Arunachal Pradesh (0.06%).