GUJARAT

Gujaratboasts of the longest coastline in the country and it has paved way for industrial development along thecoastalarea in the past couple of decades. However, the industrialization and consequent Migration have contributed majorly to increase salinity in the state.

In its latest book titled Revisiting ECOLOGY of the Gujarat coast: Trends of last two decades, city-basedGujarat Ecology Society(GES) tried ascertaining how coastal dynamics have been altered over a span of 23 years.

In 1960, Khar Land Development Board had found that 12,164 sq km land in the state was saline which increased to 16,899 sq km in 1992 as per the study done by Central Salinity Research Institute. In 2019,Indian Space Research Organisations research found 18,073 sq km of land saline.

MS Universitygot some breather this year as it featured among thetop 100 universitiesof the country in the list of National Institute of Ranking Framework (NIRF) declared by the union ministry of Education.

For the last two years,MSUfeatured in the university rank band of 101 to 150 and before that it was not even among the top 200. However, this year the university is ranked 90th with a score of 39.48. MSUs best ranking has been 76th position when the rankings were declared for the first time in 2016.
This year,Gujarat Universityhas been ranked best from the state at 43rd position and Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University (PDPU) at 73rd position. In the overall ranking this year, MSU and PDPU continues to be in the rank band of 101 to 150.
The NIRF rankings were released for a total of 10 categories overall, universities, engineering, management, pharmacy, college, medical, law, architecture, dental and research.
Like every year, MSUs pharmacy faculty has made it to top-50 securing 24th position. Last year, it was at 14th position. Faculty of Technology and Engineering has also featured at 117th position out of 1,147 institutes adjudged.

MS Universitygot some breather this year as it featured among thetop 100 universitiesof the country in the list of National Institute of Ranking Framework (NIRF) declared by the union ministry of Education.

For the last two years,MSUfeatured in the university rank band of 101 to 150 and before that it was not even among the top 200. However, this year the university is ranked 90th with a score of 39.48. MSUs best ranking has been 76th position when the rankings were declared for the first time in 2016.

This year,Gujarat Universityhas been ranked best from the state at 43rd position and Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University (PDPU) at 73rd position. In the overall ranking this year, MSU and PDPU continues to be in the rank band of 101 to 150.

The NIRF rankings were released for a total of 10 categories overall, universities, engineering, management, pharmacy, college, medical, law, architecture, dental and research.

Like every year, MSUs pharmacy faculty has made it to top-50 securing 24th position. Last year, it was at 14th position. Faculty of Technology and Engineering has also featured at 117th position out of 1,147 institutes adjudged.

To be modelled on and Project Elephant, Project Lion was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 15, 2020.

The funding proposal for the project involves Rs 712 crore for habitat and Population management and Rs 375 crore for communities as stakeholders under the Sinh Mitra Yojana. Other aspects are Rs 203 crore for lion Health management, Rs 120 crore for human-wildlife Conflict Management, Rs 152 crore for surveillance and monitoring, and Rs 74 crore for research and Learning. The details were outlined by sources with knowledge of the project.

Under Project Lion, the State Government aims to establish a National Wildlife Disease Diagnostic Centre for a projected Investment of Rs 71 crore. A lion cell at the Union ministry of Environment, forest and Climate-change”>Climate Change is also envisioned for an investment of Rs 31.65 crore under the proposed plan. CM Rupani in his address said that the state government has taken up the tasks of maintaining the health of the lions and their conservation by developing a new concept of an advanced lion hospital. Other features, he said, are lion ambulance, rescue and rapid action team, trackers, and Vanyaprani Mitras in Sasan Gir with public participation.
For breeding of lions, gene pools have been started at three places: Rampara in Saurashtra, and Sakkarbaug and Satveerada in Junagadh.

The Gujarat forest department had announced in June last year that the Asiatic lion population has increased by 29% over the past five years from 523 in 2015 to 674 in 2020. The distribution range of lions in the Saurashtra region of Gujarat, where Gir is situated, has increased by 36% from 22,000 sq km in 2015 to 30,000 sq km.

Even as businesses battled revenue shortfalls and faced WORKING CAPITAL issues, fresh loan disbursals to Women entrepreneurs surged 32% in the pandemic year of 2020-21. This Growth rate was much lower at 8.2% in 2019-20, shows the latest data compiled by the State Level Bankers Committee (SLBC)-Gujarat.

Fresh loans worth Rs 20,132 crore were extended to women entrepreneurs in 2020-21 as compared to Rs 15,252 crore in 2019-20. The disbursals grew noticeably but the number of beneficiaries declined to 7.87lakhfrom 8.57 lakh during the period under review.

The pandemic caused a major disruption across businesses in most sectors. As a consequence, the requirement for working capital went up. People who had registered businesses in the name of their wives availed these loans. At the same time, many were compelled to diversify their business and they did so in the name of the women in their family for easy credit availability.

Gujarathas been consistent in securing top ranking inthe nationalfood safety index, said the , ahead of World Food Safety Day to be observed on Wednesday under the theme Food Standards Save Lives.

In 2021-22 assessment, Gujarat secured the second position among large states in the State Food Safety Index (SFSI) rankings. In the previous two years, 2020-21 and 2019-20, Gujarat held the first rank in theSFSIranking for large states. Goa claimed the top spot in the inaugural SFSI ranking.

The Union Government introduced the SFSI to assesses the performance of states based on various parameters. These parameters encompass food sampling, testing, laboratory Infrastructure, compliance, training, licencing, and registration, as well as the quality of available food.

R S Sodhi, managing director of the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF) has received Asian Productivity Organization (APO), Tokyo, Japan regional award as Asia Pacific productivity champion.

Sodhi is the first person in the last 20 years from India to receive the award. Government of Indias National Productivity Council (NPC) under the Department of Promotion of and Internal Trade, Ministry of Commerce & Industry had unanimously recommended Sodhis name for APO award from India.

On theGujarat ‘s directions, the State Government came up with a new set of guidelines for passing detention orders under thePrevention of Anti-Social Activities Act(PASA), which ask the authorities concerned not to invoke this law without due verification and based merely on a single offence.

The bench noted that the HC has in the last two years quashed approximately 5,500 PASA orders because the authorities do not distinguish between ‘public order’ and ‘law and order’.

The Kaira District Co-operative Milk Producers Union Limited popularly known asAmul Dairywill set upoxygenplants in Nadiad and Balasinor districts in addition to Anand.
The co-operative has set up anoxygen plantatShree Krishna Hospital(SKH) at Karamsad in Anand. The plant with a capacity of producing 20,000 litres per hour of Oxygen and can serve 60 patients in a day.

Amul will establish more oxygen Plants in Nadiad and Balasinor. SKH is treating Covid patients from all overGujarat. Keeping this in mind, the first plant was established at this hospital.

Governor AcharyaDevvratsaid thatGujaratwill soon emerge as the role model for the country in natural farming and farmers should adopt natural farming as a peoples movement.

The governor said that natural farming has been adopted in almost every village of Gujarat. He added that there is a need for more and more farmers to adopt natural farming as the use of chemical Fertilizers has been making the less productive every year.