UTTARAKHAND

During the lastUttarakhandassembly in 2017, plain districts recorded the highest voter turnouts and hill districts, where Migration had emptied out villages, the least. A report named Migration & Uttarakhand 2017 Electoral Data, released on Friday by Dehradun-based think tank Social Development for Communities (SDC) Foundation, suggests that migration was a major reason behind constituencies in remote areas recording very low voting. According to the report, the Average voter turnout in Uttarakhand was 65.6% in 2017.

In 2017, the highest voter turnout, between 81-82%, was recorded in three constituencies of plain district Haridwar: Laksar (81.95%), Haridwar (rural) (81.76%) and Piran Kaliyar (81.6%). The lowest turnouts were in three seats of two hill districts:Salt(46.01%) in Almora district, Chaubattakhal (46.91%) and Lansdowne (47.87%), both in Pauri Garhwal district. Ghansali inTehri Garhwaldistrict had 49.19 polling Percentage.

In an attempt to give an impetus to the development of the State, the Uttarakhand government has decided to develop the State on the basis of the hub spoke model. For this the State cabinet in its meeting approved the Uttarakhand Policy- 2022.

The meeting was chaired by the chief minister Puskhar Singh Dhami. Informing about the cabinet decisions, secretary Shailesh Bagauli said that the objective of the new policy is to set up a simple, active and responsible system under which new inland container depots, cold storage and other logistics Infrastructure would be constructed, developed and connected with road and railways. The hub spoke logistic model would help in strengthening the economic relations between the plain and mountainous areas so that benefits of the commercial value chains are achieved. The policy would also promote private Investment in the State by developing forward and backward linkages. The existing warehouses would be upgraded and handholding would be provided to the new logistic operators under the new policy. In another decision the cabinet approved the proposal to extend the benefit of free textbook scheme to all the students of classes IX to XII enrolled in the government and the aided schools of the State from the next academic session. In another decision, the cabinet gave its approval to the Uttarakhand State parking policy (site selection, construction and operation) – 2022.

The disabled persons in the State would also receive the benefit of 25 per cent rebate in the stamp duty for mutation of the properties up to Rs 25 lakh. At present this rebate is provided to the Women of the State.

A wildlife rescue centre being developed on 30 hectare area in Dhela zone of Corbett will be the biggest facility of its kind in the state. According to officials, a 30 strong staff including veterinary surgeon, physician and anaesthesia expert will work at this centre. A sum of about Rs 10 crore has been spent on this project so far. The part of the centre prepared so far is already being used for treatment of tiger, leopard and elephant while after completion, the centre will also be able to provide treatment to bear, snakes, birds and other wildlife. Currently, this centre is being used to provide treatment to five leopards and two tigers.

Corbett national park director Rahul said that after Prime Minister Narendra Modis visit, the plan for establishment of this wildlife rescue centre was announced in 2019. The total cost of the project is about Rs 19 crore out of which a sum of about Rs 10 crore has already been spent on the facility which is under construction. The five leopards brought here for treatment include two each from Rishikesh and Rudrapur and one from Nainital. Two of these leopards were found to be attacking villagers while three were rescued in an injured condition. The big cats under treatment will be released in the jungles after they are found to be fit for release, added Rahul.

TheUttarakhandcabinet gave its nod to a proposal to replace the antiquated revenue Police system in the state with regular police, which will be done in a phase-wise manner. Presently, Uttarakhand is the only state in the country where the revenue police, popularly known as ‘patwari police’, operates, wherein the revenue staff double up as police officers in the hill districts.
The demand to replace the revenue police was a long-standing one and matters came to a head during the recent resort murder in Rishikesh where the role of revenue police officials in not registering the case and even siding with the accused, came to Light.

The cabinet decided that the easing out of revenue police would be done first in villages which are close to regular police jurisdiction areas. Thereafter, six new police stations and 20 new police outposts will be set up in revenue police areas which have witnessed a rise in tourism and commercial activities. The six new police stations to be opened in areas earlier controlled by revenue police are: Yamkeshwar in Pauri district, Chham in Tehri, Ghat in Chamoli, Khansaun in Nainital and Deghat and Dhaulcheena in Almora district.

o provide better air connectivity to tourists, theUttarakhandgovernment is all set to upgrade 13 key helipads into heliports.

The heliports, which will enable operation of more choppers, will be developed at a budget of around Rs 100 crore, officials said, adding the helipads that have been identified to be upgraded in places include Sahastradhara (Dehradun),Gauchar,Chinyalisaur, New Tehri, Srinagar, Almora, Nainital, Haldwani,Joshimath, Haridwar, Dharchula,RamnagarandMussoorie.

The project would be funded by the Centre under its Regional Connectivity Scheme. As per the proposal, the development of each helipad would cost between Rs 7 crore to Rs 8 crore.

It is pertinent to mention here that a sum of Rs 12,00 to 15,00 is spent every time a dialysis patient undergoes dialysis. A sum of Rs 18,000 to Rs 20,000 is spent every month on peritoneal dialysis of patients.

Launched on December 25, 2018, the AAUY provides a cover of Rs five lakh per annum to all 23 lakh families of Uttarakhand in the panelled hospitals under the scheme. Patients can avail benefit of the scheme for 1,350 types of diseases in the panelled hospitals.

A total of 3.11 lakh patients have so far availed the benefit of the scheme and a sum of Rs 390 crore has been spent on the Yojana so far.

InUttarakhand,anaemia among childrenbetween 9 months and 4 years, 11 months has improved by one point as its Percentage fell from 59.8% to 58.8% according to the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) IV (2015-16) to NFHS V (2020-2021) respectively. However, the state’s children are significantly anaemic.

The trend of increasing anaemia among children is higher in the hill districts when compared to the plains. The data indicates that over 50% children sampled are anaemic in Uttarkashi (73.6%), Chamoli (65.5%), Haridwar (63.1%), Tehri (61.1%), Udham Singh Nagar (60.8%), Nainital (59.8%), Dehradun (59.5%), Almora (57.7), Pauri (57.2%), Rudraprayag (52.4%), while in Bageshwar it is 43.7%, Champawat (43.1%) and Pithoragarh (36.2%).

The sample size varied as per the districts’ Population. While five districts have shown a rising in anaemia, the health department is concerned about the hill districts in particular, Chamoli (11.9%), Almora (9.1%) and Dehradun (8.9%), where the problem has increased by almost 9 points.

Uttarakhand’s target is to test at least 2.5 lakh tribal population for sickle cell anaemia, an inherited category. This mean some of these children may have inherited the disease genetically. Anaemia obstructs flow of Oxygen to the body’s Tissues due to lack of haemoglobi, which in turns leads to multiple medical issues including tiredness, irregular heartbeat, chest pain and shortness of breath. Among children, it leads to stunting which may impede overall Growth.

Uttarakhand tourism ministerSatpal Maharaj has announced that the government doubled the subsidy for the people ofUttarakhandundertaking Kailash Mansarovar yatra from Rs 25,000 to Rs 50,000. Besides, he directed officials to fill up the 126 vacant posts of the tourism department at the earliest to boost tourism.

Out of the budget of Rs 39.23 crore for development works at Badrinath, the Centre has already released Rs 11.77 crore.