BIHAR

State energy ministerBijendra Prasad Yadavon Thursday said in the legislative council that sincehas totally ignored the incremental improvement inBihar, it further increased the states claim for special status. He said Resources required for development would be easily available if special category status was accorded to the state.

The development index of different states varies at different levels. The Growth that Bihar has achieved in different sectors had not been taken into account by NITI Aayog. In 2004-05, 54.4% of the Population in Bihar was below POVERTY level and the number came down to 33.7% in 2011.

He added for Multidimensional Poverty Index, only two criteria in Education-sector”>Education sector had been taken into account. However, Bihar has made progress in different categories in this sector. In 2005, 5.6 lakh students had appeared for the Matriculation examination and the number increased to over 16 lakh in 2011. In the same time period, the number of students who appeared for Intermediate examination increased from 3.5 lakh to 13.51 lakh. Various schemes like cycle yojana and kanya protsahan yojana have led to huge jump in enrolment of girl students.

The number of cases registered and disposed of relating to crimes committed against Women have increased by 13.05% and 19.7%, respectively in 2021-22, when compared to previous year, according to theBihar Economic Surveyreport, which was released by the recently.

It may be attributed to increased awareness and integrated support provided by theSakhi Centre, the one-stop centre scheme of the government, as many women are coming forward to register cases with the authorities concerned, the officials said. The scheme was started in April 2016 in all 38 districts, to provide assistance to women affected by violence, both in private and public spaces, and facilitate immediate emergency and non-emergency access to a range of Services that include Police, medical, legal aid and psychological support.

Earlier, due to a lack of information, adolescent girls and women were generally ignorant of their rights, but to protect them from atrocities and overcome this challenge, the state government carried out awareness drives across the state through workshops, symposiums, seminars, and organised street play on child marriage, dowry harassment, sexual harassment at the workplace and foeticide.

Union RAILWAY ministerAshwini Vaishnaw saidBiharhas got an allocation of Rs 8,505 crore in the Union Budget for achieving an all-round Development Of Railway Network. The budgetary allocation for the state was raised 7.5 times more as compared to earlier budgetary allocations of total Rs 1132 crore between 2009 and 2014.

Adequate budgetary allocations have been made for gauge conversion, which included Jayanagar-Darbhanga-Narkatiaganj (Rs125 crore) while Sakri-Laukaha Bazar-Nirmali-Saharsa-Forbesganj (Rs105 crore) and Mansi-Saharsa- Madhepura-Purnia (Rs8 crore).

Bihar CMNitish Kumar welcomed theUnion Budget2022-23 presented by finance ministerNirmala Sitharamanand called it a balanced budget.

“For the last two years, the countrys development has been affected due to covid-19 pandemic. The Centre has taken several steps to accelerate the speed of development to bring the country out from the adverse situation, which is praiseworthy. I congratulate the Union Government for presenting a balanced Budget,” Nitish Kumar said.

The Union governments decision to build on a large scale in the country is also laudable, he said in a statement.

The CM also said that the Bihar government has been developing a corridor of Organic Farming from its own Resources in 13 districts located on both the banks of Ganga river.

The Bihar CM also praised the announcement to build 80 lakh new houses under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana.

A number of ambitious projects and development schemes in the district are likely to be completed this year.

The Sultanganj (Bhagalpur)-Aguwani Ghat (Khagaria) bridge across the Ganga, under construction for the last eight years, is likely to be completed by the end of this year. The foundation for the 3,160-metre-long four-lane cablestay bridge along with approach road with an estimated cost of Rs1,710 crore was laid by CM Nitish Kumar on February 23, 2014. The bridge would link NH-31 and 107, reducing the distance between Sultanagnj and Khagaria, Saharsa, Supaul and Madhepura.

The much awaited Khagaria-Munger rail-cum-road bridge across the Ganga is also likely to be opened for traffic on January 16. The 44-km-long Khagaria-Kusheshwar Asthan RAILWAY project with an estimated cost of Rs162 crore is expected to be commissioned this year. The foundation for this project was laid by the then railway minister, Ram Vilas Paswan, in 1998. Paswan hailed from Khagaria district.

A cluster-based Food Processing park is set to be operational near Mansi. It will generate EMPLOYMENT for about 3,000 skilled and semi-skilled people. A cattle-feed manufacturing unit with a cost of Rs50 crore is underway at Maheshkhunt Bazar. It will produce 300 metric tonnes of cattle-feed per day.

Chief ministerNitish Kumar asked the officials concerned to work for increasing the state’s green cover from existing 15% to 17%.

The state was left with just 9% of green cover after its bifurcation. “Massive plantation drives launched in 2012 saw the plantation of as many as 22 crore saplings in coming years. The state’s green cover has now reached 15%. We want to bring it to 17%,” he said.

The CM appealed to the people to plant saplings near their homes. “Increase in greenery has resulted in lovely surroundings in the state,” Nitish said. He asked the officials concerned to launch massive awareness campaigns across the state and expedite the planation drive to boost greenery.

The outstanding ofBiharwhich mounted to Rs 1.93 lakh crore in 2019-20 has put strains on the states finances as it has led to debt repayment burden and the shrinkage in Capital Expenditure that is otherwise made to create assets as part of the Infrastructure development, according toComptroller and Auditor General(CAG) report for the 2019-20 fiscal tabled in the state assembly.

According to the report, the outstanding public debt of the state had increased from Rs 1.16 lakh crore in 2015-16 to Rs 1.38 lakh crore in the next fiscal, followed by Rs 1.56 lakh crore in 2017-18, Rs 1.68 lakh crore in 2018-19 and Rs 1.93 lakh crore in 2019-20. The Growth rate of the outstanding public debt was in the range of 17.69% in 2015-16, 18.99% in 2016-17, 13.02% in 2017-18, 7.75% in 2018-19 and 14.48% in 2019-20, the report added.

The growth rate of the states gross state domestic product (GSDP) in the corresponding financial years was 8.35%, 13.31%, 11.33%, 13.15% and 15.36%. The growth rate of public debt is higher than the growth rate of GSDP during the year, which is not a good fiscal indicator, the report noted.

In what could increase the anxiety of the stakeholders, the volume of capital expenditure also showed decreasing trend during 2018-19 and 2019-20. The capital expenditure was Rs 23,966 crore in 2015-16, Rs 27,208 crore in 2016-17 and Rs 28,907 crore in 2017-18, and then began to show falling trend in the subsequent two fiscals Rs 21,058 crore in 2018-19 and Rs 12,304 crore in 2019-20. Implicitly, the state had been spending less on the creation of assets.

The CAG report also noted that the states debt has become unsustainable in the backdrop of the Revenue Deficit for the first time since 2008-09 and this has been compensated from public debt.

In between, the debt repayments went on increasing Rs 38,508 crore in 2015-16, Rs 50,701.29 crore in 2016-17, Rs 41,357.18 crore in 2017-18, Rs 61,666.46 crore in 2018-19 and Rs 69,732.59 crore in 2019-20. The amount spent on interest repayment has also shown a similar trend.