MAHARASHTRA

Make your village ‘corona free’, win Rs 50 lakh: Maharashtra government

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TheMaharashtragovernment announced a “corona freevillage” contest with an aim to encourage steps to curb the spread ofCovid-19in rural areas of the state.

Chief ministerUddhav Thackerayrecently lauded efforts made by some villages to stem the spread of the viral infection and announced the “My Village Corona Free” initiative.

The “corona free village” contest is part of the initiative announced by the chief minister, stateRural DevelopmentMinisterHasan Mushrifsaid in a statement.

Prizeswill be given to three village panchayats doing good work in Covid-19 management in each revenue division.

The first prize will be of Rs 50 lakh, second of Rs 25 lakh and third of Rs 15 lakh, the minister said.

Maharashtra feat: Pune set to pilot unique land digital identification initiative

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The state has selected Pune to pilot the Unique Land Parcel Identification Number (ULPIN) project for facilitating IT-based management of records.

Christened “Aadhaarfor land”, the 14-digit Unique Land Parcel Identification Number aims at identifying every surveyed parcel of land and also preventing any fraud related to land.

Union finance ministerNirmala Sitharaman, in herBudgetspeech, mentioned about ULPIN and encouraged all states to roll out the process. Pilots on the project have been carried out in select districts of 10 states, includingMaharashtra.The other states are Haryana, Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, , Goa, Madhya Pradesh andKarnataka.

For Pune district, all land parcels were marked and numbered according to their latitude and longitude coordinates. The unique number will have ownership details of a plot, besides its size and longitudinal and latitudinal details up to the taluka level and beyond.

Maharashtra plans toll-free helpline 181 for women

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The announced a toll-free helpline 181 for Women across the state. The helpline will be operational in two weeks. It will be available on all days of the week, 24 hours of the day.

This initiative is part of the Centres Mission Shakti. Women can dial the helpline to seek help on issues like dowry and child marriage and for information about programmes for women in the state.

Public University Act, 2016 (Third Amendment) Bill

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The Maharashtra Legislative Council passed the “Maharashtra Public University Act, 2016 (Third Amendment) Bill” on 28 December.

Highlights:

The act is being opposed because it calls for LGBTQIA community members to be included on university boards.

A provision for a “Board of Equal Opportunity” is included in the amended act.

A board of equal opportunity shall be established in each university, according to the act. The board will be in charge of planning, monitoring, guiding, and coordinating a variety of development and welfare programs, regulations, policies.

It also is in charge of schemes aimed at ensuring the welfare, development, and social protection of students, non-TEACHING employees, and teachers from underrepresented groups, minorities, Women, and LGBTQIA people.

These rights will be extended to “persons with disabilities for the purpose of promoting and establishing values of , Equality, dignity, and social Justice.”

Cybercrimes shoot up by 112% in Mumbai in five years

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Cybercrimes in the city surged 112% in five years -from 1,361 cases in 2017 to 2,883 in 2021-according to a report released by non-profit Praja Foundation recently.

Cheating cases, whether through loan apps, matrimonial frauds or job scams, topped the list of cybercrimes last year with 1,154 FIRs being lodged. Online frauds involving debit/credit cards were next on the list-1,075 FIRs filed.

According to the data, detection rate of cybercrimes was low at 16% in 2021. Experts pointed out that the number of FIRs being registered were very less compared to actual complaints.

Maharashtra government includes 961ha mangroves in reserved forest

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he state forest department has taken over additional 961 hectares ofmangrovesto be protected as reserved forest under Section 4 of the Indian Forest Act, 1927.

State Environment MinisterAaditya Thackerayhad tweeted that earlier 1,433 ha MANGROVES were declared as reserved forest under Section 20 of the Act. With this, the total mangrove area under protection in Ratnagiri is now more than 2,394 ha.

Cidco itself has said that it has over 1,000 hectares to be transferred, and a recent declaration by JNPT said it has more than 900 hectares, Kumar tweeted in respnose to Thackerays tweet. He pointed out that vast sea forests under Navi Mumbai SEZ are yet to be accounted for.

Ration card norms eased for third gender beneficiaries in Maharashtra

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TheMaharashtragovernment has relaxed norms for third gender persons who are applying for a ration card and waived the requirement of submitting an identity proof and residence proof.

Under the new rules, the application of third gender people for ration cards will be considered if one of the following criteria are met: if they have their names registered in the state or city Aids control Society, if their names are on a voter ID card, even if it does not identify them as transgender persons. Their application will be considered if they are certified as transgender by the collector’s office, social welfare department or charity commissioner’s office. If they do not have these documents, they can also submit a self-declaration form identifying themselves as belonging to the third gender, the government resolution says.

The Nashik Zilla Parishad has decided to link the schools in the rural areas with the local health centres to fulfil the criteria for starting physical classes for students of classes V to VII.The state government has announced starting of physical classes for students of classes V to VII in the rural areas and classes VIII to XII in urban areas. In the rural areas, physical classes for students of VIII to XII have already started to function.

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The Health monitoring is limited to any child feeling uneasy in the school. In such a case, the help of local Asha workers will also be taken. The standard operating procedure (SOP) for the schools will be announced once the decision on the same is taken, the officer said.
In the case of starting the schools in the urban areas, the health authorities said the health staff of the primary health centres can be attached to some of the schools but not all.

While parts of westernMaharashtraandKonkanare facing floods due to heavy rains, the water level in various dams of theMarathwadaregion has dipped as compared to this time last year, as per the irrigation department. The total water storage capacity of 45 big reservoirs in the region is 4,505.36 million cubic meters (MCM).

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It further said 81 medium reservoirs in the Marathwada region had 247.84 MCM water on Monday as against their total storage capacity of 1,056.42 MCM. Their storage as of now is 23.46 per cent as compared to 30.19 per cent last year, the report said.

Meagre Campa funds for wildlife, but better than other states

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The state wildlife wing and tiger reserve officials are peeved over the drastic cuts in funds for various afforestation, forest protection, and wildlife conservation works bythe NationalCompensatory Afforestation Fund Management & Planning Authority (CAMPA).

TheMaharashtraannual plan of operation outlay for 2023-24 was 841.33 crores. However, the executive committee of the National Campa has approved a little over 593 crore only.

Though the sanctioned funds come to 70% of the total outlay proposed, a review of the crucial works related to the wildlife sector shows that the total funds approved are even less than 50% and it will be difficult to manage, especially in the backdrop of the fact that grants under the Centrally Sponsored Scheme (CSS) from NTCA under the dont come in time.