PUNJAB

In a startling revelation, a Employees State Insurance Corporation (Esic) worker load in Punjab has come out to be almost 75 per cent more than the national Average.

It was also disclosed that the Centre had received a proposal from the to set up six new ESI hospitals.

The setting up of the hospitals is an ongoing process and was based on the number of insured persons in an area in accordance with the norms of the ESIC.

The state-wise details of the number of beds at hospitals run by ESIC tabled by Teli showed that Punjab had 12,16,430 workers insured under the ESIC for whom there were 300 sanctioned beds in the ESI hospitals, which work out to be 4,055 workers per ESI hospital bed.

This was almost 74.63 per cent more than the national average of 2,322 workers per ESI hospital bed.

Giving a much-needed relief to trade and in the state, the Punjab Government has exempted around 40,000 statutory form related outstanding cases under Central Sales Tax / Value Added Tax (VAT), out of over 48,000 cases related to each of the financial years 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17. Notably, Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi had announced the decision at the Progressive Punjab Investors Summit in Ludhiana.

The State Government is fully committed to create a conductive ecosystem for Ease of Doing Business in the state. The fullsome support to trade and industry will help the Punjab to emerge as the front runner state across the country. This industry-friendly initiative would go a long way to instil confidence and boost morale to invest in the state.

After 20 days of suspension of mid-day meals in most of the government and government-aided schools, the has released about Rs 54 crore as cooking cost to 19,700 schools.

The schools get cooking cost at the rate of Rs 4.97 per student for primary classes and Rs 7.45 for upper primary classes per student from the state government. The cooking cost under the scheme involves purchase of cooking oil, pulses, vegetables and condiments. Under the national programme, 60 per cent of the cooking cost is shared by the Centre and 40 per cent by the state.

To provide affordable housing to lower-middle income and lower-income families, and revive the real estate sector in the state, the Punjab Housing and Urban Development Department will soon come up with a new affordable housing policy, said Housing and Urban Development Minister Aman Arora.

He said the draft of the new policy had been uploaded on the official website for seeking suggestions from the public.

In the new policy, Arora said, the minimum area for a plotted colony had been fixed at five acres and the minimum area required for group housing was two acres. The saleable area had been increased to 65 per cent as compared to 55 per cent in normal colonies to provide plots at affordable rates to the common man. The saleable area was being given on the total plot area of the project irrespective of any master plan road passing through it.

Punjab Agriculture-notes-for-state-psc-exams”>Agriculture Minister Randeep Singh Nabha said that Chemicals and Fertilisers Minister Mansukh Mandaviya has assured 10 rakes of DAP (Diammonium Phosphate), five rakes of NPK (Complex Fertilizer) and two of SSP (Single Super Phosphate) within three to four days to the state.

Punjab has 0.74 LMT opening stock of DAP on October 1 as compared to 3.63 LMT last year (October 1, 2020).

It is being felt likely shortfall of this crucial input may appear for the sowing of wheat crop and only 20-25 days have been left for complete sowing of wheat, he said demanding an additional allocation of 1.50 LMT of DAP in October expeditiously, he said

According to Nabha, Punjab got only 80,951 MT DAP against an allocation plan of 1,97,250 MT, which is 41 per cent of the total allocation while Haryana got 89 per cent (Supply Plan 58650, Despatched 52155) of total allocation. Uttar Pradesh, he said, got 170 per cent (Supply Plan 60000, dispatched 102201) and Rajasthan 88 per cent (Supply Plan 67890, dispatched 59936).

Asserting his continued support to the farmers agitating against the Centres three black farm laws, Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh on Friday launched Rs 520 crore debt relief scheme for 2.85 lakh farm labourers and landless farmers, in a befitting tribute to former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhis pro-poor vision of the former Prime Minister.

The Chief Minister said that the had decided to waive off loans amounting to Rs 520 crores of farm labour and landless farmers with respect to the principal amount against their cooperative loans as on July 31, 2017, and Simple Interest at the rate of seven percent per annum on the said amount till March 6, 2019. Notably, the State Government had earlier waived off Rs 4,700 crore worth of loans (up to Rs two lakh of crop loan each) for 5.85 lakh small and marginal farmers.

Punjab Youth Development Board(PYDB) chairmanSukhwinder Singh Bindraon Sunday claimed that the Ludhiana has assured more than 20,000 jobs to local youth in the next few months. He also lauded the contribution of Ludhiana industry for always supporting Punjab governments flagship Ghar Ghar Rozgar scheme.

The PYDB chairman held a meeting with several representatives of Ludhiana industry at the Chamber of Industrial & Commercial Undertakings (CICU) complex. The meeting was attended by all office bearers of CICU including president Upkar Singh Ahuja, general secretary Pankaj Sharma along with representatives of associations related to knitwear, shawl, blanket, plywood, dyeing, processing and furnace industries.

Taking a digital leap to catch hold of property tax defaulters, the Ludhiana (MC) has started using a mobile application to come up with maps of different blocks with details of properties in the city. With the help of GIS mapping, the officials have used colour coding to distinguish properties in order to identify tax defaulters.

The department has further integrated the data of GIS mapping with the maps with the help of which UID numbers of the properties have now been marked in the mobile application.

To overcome the challenge of unavailability of paddy straw-based pellets,Punjabnow has two manufacturing units as a pilot project that is likely to start operations this month. After successful trials of using paddy straw pellets as a substitute to coal in the brick kiln Industry in Punjab and the industrial boilers, the Punjab Pollution Control Board along with the Punjab State Council for Science and Technology (PSCST) had successfully got carried out trials on manufacturing of paddy straw pellets.

The two pilot projects have come up at Kalbucha village in Patiala district and the other in Moga district, with each having a capacity of 250kgper hour per tonne (PHT). Additional Director PSCST, Pritpal Singh, These two manufacturing units of paddy-straw based stubble will soon be operational. The Patiala-based plant manufacturing unit was about to start its operations but due to request by farmers, it was halted as farmers nearby wanted that there should be no risk to their standing wheat crops.

Amid Covid-induced lockdown, the Punjab hotel has taken a hit and suffered a revenue loss of around Rs 10,000 crore in 2020-21 fiscal, the Punjab Hotel Association said

Punjab Hotel Association president Satish Arora says they have written to the Chief Minister, seeking immediate support

He demanded salary of staff for six months, deferment of electricity charges for six months, deferment of water sanitation, licence fee, property tax and cow cess, waiver of fee to be paid for renewal of excise and all other permits

He says the RBI must extend EMIs for at least a year and waive interest loan as the industry has been struggling since March 2020