KERALA

Keralaneeds to focus on challenges emerging from thedemographic transitionas the strategies adopted by the state now will determine the future course of transition, says a recent study by theCentre for Socio-Economic and Environmental Studies,Kochi.
Given its early onset, demographic transition in Kerala is now at the matured stage with fertility below the replacement level, life expectancy at birth above 75 years, decadal Growth rate of Population at 5% during 2001-2011 with negative growth in two districts. The demographic advantage has created certain unique challenges for the state that are yet to be visible at the national level.

With mortality transition, Kerala experienced an obvious shift in the disease pattern from communicable to non-communicable diseases (NCD) and emerged as the state experiencing the highest level of epidemiological transition in the country. Between 1990 and 2016, NCD accounts for three-fourths of the total burden of diseases in the state and thus shifted the mortality up to mid-seventies.

Given the global experience, the study highlights that there remains untapped potential in the state to postpone the age-specific mortality from degenerative diseases from the current age group of 70+ further to the advanced age group of 80+.

Kerala, with the highest proportion of elderly among all states in India, has already started recognizing the unique Health needs of elderly as a group. The study calls for further refinement in strategies targeting interventions to address the intra-group differentials in mortality to postpone the death rates to advanced ages of 80 and above. This also calls for age-sex disaggregated data across major killer diseases in the advanced age groups.

Paving way for the commissioning of the muchhyped Kerala Fibre Optic Network (Kfon) project in the district, more than 90% of the government offices which come under the first phase of the project have been connected to the optical fibre cable network.

Once the Kfon project is operational, government offices and educational institutions in the limits of the project will get high-speed Internet and it will help such offices provide various Services to the public in a fast and efficient manner.

The project will help set up Wi-Fi zones in different areas thereby providing free internet connectivity to the public. The telecom service providers also can use the facility by paying rentals. The laying of optical fibre cables for the first phase of the project has been completed by more than 85%.

Students in Kerala are likely to be taught the portions that the NCERT had deleted from its class 11 and 12 textbooks, including those pertaining to the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi and the ban on RSS.

The NCERT recently had, in the name of rationalisation of the syllabus, dropped from its class 12 HISTORY textbook certain portions on Mahatma Gandhi and how his pursuit of Hindu-Muslim unity “provoked Hindu extremists”. It also left out the portion where the government placed a ban on the RSS after Gandhi’s assassination. The revision of textbooks by obfuscating facts has triggered a row.

The State Council of Education Research and Training (SCERT), an autonomous body of the General Education Department, is considering a decision by its curriculum steering committee to include these deleted portions in the state syllabus.

The committee, which met on Tuesday, has entrusted General Education Minister V Sivankutty with taking a final decision on the matter after consulting with the government and Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan.

Confirming the development, Sivankutty told reporters here that the SCERT and the Curriculum Committee take decisions on the academic affairs of the general education department of the state.

As per an MoU entered with the NCERT, Kerala has been using their 44 textbooks, and of them, there has been a significant change in the content of subjects including history, political science, economics, and Sociology at the higher-secondary level, the minister explained.

The gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher Education rose to 32% inKarnatakain 2019-2020, against 28.8% in the year before that, but the state continues to lag behind its neighbours, especiallyTamil Naduand Kerala which are far ahead.

GER is a statistical measure used to determine the Percentage of students enrolled in different levels of education from the total Population of the corresponding age group.

The All India Survey of Higher Education released on Thursday showed the GER among girls in the state was 32.7, against 31.2 in boys.

While Karnatakas GER is higher than the national figure of 27.1% in the 18-23 age group, it ranks 15th among other states and UTs. The highest GER is in , at 76%. Karnatakas neighbours are ahead: TN (51%), Kerala (39%),Telangana(36%), AP (35%) andMaharashtra(32.3%).

Karnataka has been the laggard despite having the third highest number of colleges in the country (4,047), after Uttar Pradesh (7,788) and Maharashtra (4,494). It also has the highest college density: 59 colleges per lakh eligible population in teh 18-23 age group. Interestingly, the state established the highest number of new colleges in 2019 181 and 18 of them were in the government sector, but the enrolment is below that of many other states.

The continues its development rhetoric citing the initiatives it launched, many of which had figured in the claims in the previous years too, as the second LDF government led by Pinarayi Vijayan completed its second year.

In an article released to the media on the occasion of the second anniversary of the government, the chief minister said that the government is holding the basic class as well as the new generation of the state close to it alike while going ahead.

Through these, investments worth Rs 8,300 crore and three lakh job opportunities have been created. In six years, the IT exports of the state doubled. By 2026, the government targets to launch 15,000 startups in the state, the chief minister said.

Vijayan said that the state’s Agriculture-notes-for-state-psc-exams”>Agriculture sector has registered a Growth of 4.64% in 2021-22, despite the setbacks in the form of floods in 2018 and 2019 and Covid-19 in 2020.

TheKeralastate board (KSBB) is planning a two-pronged strategy to update the peoples biodiversity register (PBR) in all panchayats. ThePBRproject was launched in 2009, and in a few years Kerala has become one of the first states to have completed the PBRs in all local bodies.

KSBB has prepared the PBRs in all the 1,034 local bodies which include six corporations, 87 municipalities, and 941 grama panchayats. Following instructions from the national biodiversity authority (NBA), the state is planning to digitise the entire documentation process.

Already aBIOMIS(biodiversity management information system) has become operational. It is a web-enabled unique repository for biodiversity information systems for the state boards.

In the budget of Kerala that was presented by Finance Minister KN Balagopal, importance has been given to the IT sector of the state, with the focus being given to the futuristic 5G networks.Expeditious steps will be initiated by the Kerala government to bring the 5G system to the state and to move forward rapidly in the service sector.

development of the IT sector was another important announcement.

Along with the existing NH 66, four IT corridors will be made parallel to it as part of decentralizing the states IT sector. There will be four lanes in the corridors which will be Koratty-Ernakulam, Thiruvananthapuram Technopark phase-III-Kollam, Kozhikode-Kannur, and Ernakulam-Cherthala. For the extension of the IT corridor, an IT facility will be set up in Kollam which will cover an area of 5,00,000 square feet.

A new IT park will be constructed at Kannur. Satellite IT parks will be built on 15-25 acres of land obtained at premium prices through land acquisition on the proposed corridor with convenient access from Kozhikode, Ernakulam, and Technopark Phase III through NH 66. In addition, the acquired land would be used to build 20 small parks ranging in size from 50,000 to 2 lakh square feet.

As part of promoting Literacy and developing reading habits among the members of Scheduled Caste and scheduled tribe communities, the government has decided to give free access and membership for all the students from the community, including those who are enrolled for higher studies, in all the libraries across the state.

The literacy rate of tribals in the state is 74.44%, much lower than the state Average of 93.91 % as per the census 2011, though significantly higher than the national average of 59%.

The novel decision is being implemented in cooperation with thestate library council, which would mean that the students will be given access to all the 8,182 libraries that are affiliated with theKerala state library council. As per the order issued by the government in this regard on Wednesday, the government will launch new libraries in places especially the tribal settlements.

Waste collection in Kalamassery limit is going to be on online mode soon. The local body has decided to install QR codes in households, hotels and other institutions from where Haritha Karma Sena (HKS) workers collect waste.

The local body has already developed anappnamed My Kalamassery and payment forwaste collectionhas been collected via the app for the past six months.

After collectingwastefrom registered users, Haritha Karma Sena workers will scan the QR code, using the phone, placed in front of the households/hotels alerting the users about the status of waste collection.

The local body will have to print around 15,000 QR codes and it needs to buy some android phones as many HKS workers use old phones.