Principal secretary Puneet Kumar Goel is the new chief secretary of Goa.
He took charge on Tuesday following the retirement of Parimal Rai.
Goel, a 1991 cadre officer has held important portfolios finance included since his posting in Goa two years ago.
He will hold portfolios that were held by Rai such as Home, personnel, general administration.
The order appointing Goel as chief secretary was issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs last month.
Goa has a rich splattering of 254 species of butterflies and quite a few of them are endemic to the state. Soon, Goa is set to become the seventh Indian state to have a state butterfly. The forest department has formed a committee of ecologists and has begun consultations with over a hundred scientists, conservationists and other experts.
There are five butterfly species that have been shortlisted and are in the race to be declared as the states emblem species.
Goa already has a designated state animal, tree and bird, and now it is time to nominate a state butterfly to recognise its ecological significance and conservation value.
In case of preparatory, middle, and secondary stage, we will start implementation from 2024 from Classes III, VI, and IX, and will take it forward phasewise with Classes IV, V, and X from 2025. But at the foundational level, though we are starting with children aged three, we may implement it in more than one class or all classes up to Class II from 2024, if we feel ready,” said Lolayekar.
He said that May 31, 2025, will be the last date for all pre-primary schools in Goa to get approval to operate from the directorate of Education. This will also be the deadline for pre-primary schools to meet the expected infrastructural requirements.
There are around 3,000 such schools in Goa, of which around 1,500 are anganwadis run by the directorate of Women and child development. Fifty are attached to government schools and around 1,500 are private pre-primary schools.
He said that the committee is expected to give its report within three months, based on which the work on the state-specific syllabus will begin.
He also said that as many pre-primary schools are yet to register on the directorate of education’s online portal, the date will be extended further (from the present deadline of June 15).
Efforts are under way to make the Goa state commission for persons with disabilities (PwDs) a separate department, saidGuruprasad Pawaskar, state commissioner forPwDs. The body currently operates under theSocial Welfare Department.
After the success of the first edition of the Purple Festival in Goa which was the first-ever inclusive festival for PwDs, Pawaskar has asked for suggestions from members of the disability community to formulate policies for PwDs in Sports and tourism sectors.
The commission is also contemplating making various grounds and stadia under theSports Authority of Goa(SAG) accessible to PwDs and invite special trainers as well as coaches to Goa to train para-athletes in the state at these grounds.
For tourism, beach access is also in the process at Baga, Arambol, Colva and Palolem. Additionally, 40 government buildings across the state are going to be made accessible within two years.
Chief minister Pramod Sawant said that the Mapusariverneeds to be desilted. The mouth of the river has reduced drastically, he said, adding that even canoes may not pass smoothly.
The chief minister also said that it could be developed into a tourist spot with a proper promenade and beautification.
He was inMapusato lay the foundation stone for a bridge across Mapusa river.
The project, being constructed by Goa State Development Corporation (GSIDC), will help decongestion of traffic at Tarikade. He said that the Rs 10 crore bridge will be completed in the next four months.
The will soon start issuing digital marriage certificates with QR codes and will phase out certificates in the physical format.
The state law department has issued a notification stating that digital marriage certificates with aQR codewill be considered “authentic and the only type of certificate issued by the office of civil registrars-cum-sub-registrars”.
TheGoa governmentintroduced digitally-signed marriage certificates in 2020 as part of the ongoing digital reforms.
The QR code will ensure security and can be used for authentication of the marriage certificate. Citizens and authorities can verify the document’s authenticity by
Minimum temperature has started falling from October 27 as per the India meteorological department (IMD) and was one degree Celsius below its normal value on Thursday. This will continue to persist for another 24 hours, theIMDsaid.
The minimum temperature recorded inPanajion Thursday was 21C which was 2.6C below its normal value. The maximum temperature, which has been on the higher side at 33C, has increased to 34C. This will persist for three to four more days, IMD said.
Gradually, as the northerly components reduce and it will be mostly easterlies in the lower levels, the minimum temperature will rise to its normal value, IMD said.
In order to ascertain the Unemployment rate in Goa, the government has commenced a survey to find out how manyGoansand non-Goans have been employed in various sectors in the state.
The survey, which is expected to go on for a month, is being carried out by officials of the department of labour and EMPLOYMENT, who will visit industries, hotels, showrooms, supermarkets, general stores, pharmacies, garment stores, hospitals, clinics, and even kiosks.
In its annual report for 2020-21, theUnion ministry of statisticsand programme implementation (MoSPI) had said that Goa had the third highest joblessness rate in the country during that period.
Data from the independent think tank, Centre for Monitoring of Indian economy (CMIE), in May revealed that approximately nine lakh of Goa’s Population is in the employable age bracket of 20-59 years, which would suggest that around 1.4 lakh Goans remain unemployed. One of the main reasons for unemployment is the inability to attract new industrial units to the state, the data had indicated.
The federation also requested the government to formulate a special scheme under the tribal sub-plan to provide android phones to ST students and that Wi-Fi towers be set up so that online Education is not hampered.
In a letter to Sawant, GCCI said that it is willing to support and collaborate with the government in the relief efforts. The body has identified short-term measures as well as long-term measures to prevent similar instances from recurring.
GCCI has also urged the State Government to set up local Disaster Management cells across all red zones. The cells should comprise members who can actively monitor climactic changes and the resultant impact along Goas riverfront and rainwater catchment areas around Dams.