09.09.21

Air quality a serious concern in Haryana, says GJUST study

by

The whole year round, a study conducted by the Environment Science Department of the Guru Jambheshwar University of Science and Technology has revealed that the increasing Air Pollution in Haryana has become a serious concern and the seasonal practice of crop residue burning is adding to pollution.

The pollutant peaks in the post-monsoon season October-December, followed by winters. PM10 and PM2.5 increased by around 65112% and 131147% in the post-monsoon season compared to monsoons, which are usually considered clean seasons in terms of air quality as atmospheric pollutants are washed out by the rain in the season, revealed the study.

The satellite-based fire counts and source apportionment shows a significant influence of crop residue burning in the post-monsoon season and solid burning (cow-dung cake, woods, etc.) during winters on Haryanas air quality. The particulate matter, which is usually considered as a proxy of air pollution, have annual mean PM10 concentration in Zones-1, 2, and 3 as 156, 174, and 143 \/per cubic meter air\/ (gm-3), whereas for PM2.5 as 71, 85, and 78g m-3, informed Prof Narsi Ram Bishnoi, one of the leading authors of the research paper from the GJUST said.

Despite waiver, farm loans up in Punjab

by

As the institutional loans advanced to farmers soar to Rs 77,700 crore, higher than the total farm debt in 2018, the futility of the Punjab Governments flagship Farm Loan Waiver Scheme has hit Home hard.

Latest data available from the State Level Bankers Committee shows the total loans advanced to farmers in Punjab stand at Rs 77,753.12 crore, as on June 2021. When the loan waiver scheme was launched in 2018, the total loans advanced to farmers stood at Rs 74,878.46 crore. In the past over three years, since the scheme was announced and implemented, the loan advanced has increased by Rs 2,874.66 crore.

This shows the hike in total advances in the Agriculture-notes-for-state-psc-exams”>Agriculture sector is in spite of the fact that the brought out the much-hyped Farm Loan Waiver Scheme in January 2018, and claims to have waived loans of 5.64 lakh farmers worth Rs 4,624 crore. In addition, the state government has just extended the scheme for farm labourers. The government claims it wants to settle loans worth Rs 592 crore, taken by farm labourers from cooperatives, and so far, Rs 181 crore relief has been given.

Tribal youths in Himachal’s Lahaul promote agro tourism to sustain economy

by

The youths of Tino village under Kolang panchayat in the tribal district of Lahaul and Spiti are promoting agro tourism to sustain their economy.

They have started agro tourism at Gaimur village, where they have set up camps for the stay of tourists. They are planning to expand the concept across the district in the coming days.

During the stay of tourists, they are allowed to collect farm produce like organic vegetables from the nearby farmland for kitchen purpose. The motive is to give them the first-hand experience of agricultural produce harvesting and self-cooking under agro tourism plan. Similarly, in the sowing season, the tourists will be allowed to experience sowing of Agriculture-notes-for-state-psc-exams”>Agriculture crops.

These youths are promoting organic agro tourism to attract tourists to Lahaul Spiti. They have grown exotic vegetables on their land to attract the tourists, which is purely the organic produce.

Agro-tourism encompasses a wide variety of activities and provides a means to farmers to diversify and supplement their income. Such activities include wildlife study, horseback riding, cooking classes, wine tasting, harvest festivals, barn dances, farm stays, guided tours and petting zoos.

The Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami has said that at least one sports centre would be developed in every district of the state. He was addressing a webinar on Surya Namaskar- Devbhoomi Parampara Ka Adbhut Uphar.

by

The programme was organised under joint aegis of Navyog Sewa Samiti, CCRYN, Ministry of Ayush and Uttarakhand Open University. Dhami said that efforts are being made to convert the Sports College Raipur into an international sports university. He said that 50 boys and an equal number of girls of age group 8 to 14 years would be selected on the basis of their sporting talent for the CM’s Scholarship. He added that a Women‘s Sport College would be set up in Udham Singh Nagar district and a Five per cent quota would be reserved for sportspersons in the colleges and vocational courses.

Launching National Nutrition Month in Lucknow, Governor Anandiben Patel and Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said that nutrition of women and children was necessary to make the country and the state strong, capable and prosperous.

by

he two top leaders also inaugurated 529 new Anganwadi centres constructed at a cost of about Rs. 4,142 lakh in 24 districts of the state. Citations were distributed to Anganwadi workers, chief sevikas and child development project officers and appointment letters were distributed to 91 newly-selected child development project officers.

Addressing the programme, Governor Anandiben Patel said that special attention needs to be paid to the Health of Women, girls, and children in order to make the country and the state strong, capable, and prosperous. Remarkable efforts have been made by the under the Leadership of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath in this direction, she said.

Emphasising inter-departmental coordination for effective operation of various programmes during National Nutrition Month, Patel said that the results of programmes related to removal of Malnutrition among women and children could be further improved and that public participation had a useful role in getting rid of malnutrition.

Amid protest against the police lathicharge on BJP leaders and workers outside the Assembly, the Hemant Soren Government on Wednesday passed three Bills in the House. The Bills include the Jharkhand Municipal (Amendment) Bill 2021, Jharkhand Goods and Service Bill 2021 and Jharkhand State Employment of Local Candidates Bill, 2021. Among these three Bills, the Jharkhand State Employment of Local Candidates Bill is important as it paves way for 75 per cent reservation to locals in jobs upto Rs 40,000 per month at private sector.

by

Once the Jharkhand State EMPLOYMENT of Local Candidates Bill is enacted in the State, Jharkhand will become the third State in the country after Andhra Pradesh and Haryana having a law providing for reservation in private sector jobs for local residents. As the bill pertains to reservations of locals in the private sector, the Government gets passed the bill without much difficulty. On one side the Soren Government was getting passed three bills, BJP leaders and workers were staging Assembly gherao against the allotment of room at Assembly for offering Namaz. Inside the house too, BJP lawmakers were protesting against the allotment of room for Namaz.

It may be noted that the bill was earlier tabled during the budget session in March this year and was referred for vetting to six member committee formed by Speaker Rabindra Nath Mahto. The six member committee was headed by Labour Minister Satyanand Bhokta and members from different parties. The committee after going through the bill gave its Consent while making some changes.

The committee had added the words “private sector” in the amended bill, changing its name from ‘The Jharkhand State Employment of Local Candidates Bill, 2021’ to ‘The Jharkhand State Employment of Local Candidates in Private Sector Bill, 2021’. The amended legislation increased the salary limit to Rs 40,000 from the earlier Rs 30,000.

The draft resolution of bill mandates that every employer shall fill up seventy-five percent of the total existing vacancies on the date of notification of this Act and subsequent thereto by local candidates with respect to such posts where the gross monthly salary or wages are not more than Rs 40,000.

The Central Government or the shall not be included but the provisions of this Act shall apply on the organizations providing Services through Outsourcing to the Central Government or the State Government organization/undertaking, the bill says.

The other bill which was passed today was the Jharkhand Municipal (Amendment) Bill which gives power to the Jharkhand government to remove the mayor and the Chairman in the municipal bodies. As per the bill the election of mayor and Chairman in the municipal bodies in the state will not be conducted on party symbols. Apart from this mayor and deputy mayor will be elected by the elected councillors on the basis of majority.

The passing of the Bill assumes importance as reports about differences between government and municipal bodies have escalated in the past few months with most of the Municipal bodies in the State being represented by BJP.

Govt to help farmers who could not plant crops: Nitish Kumar

by

State farmers who could not plant their crop(s) due to flood would also be provided financial assistance from the .

CMNitish Kumar asked all the district magistrates (DMs) and theagriculture departmentofficials to consider non-planting of crops due to flood as the case of crop loss and provide adequate assistance to such farmers.

Nitish asked the officials of Disaster Management department (DMD), Agriculture-notes-for-state-psc-exams”>Agriculture department and the DMs to do proper panchayat-wise assessment of crop losses in the next three to four days, so that all affected farmers could be provided financial assistance.

A Population of 69.63 lakh in altogether 26 districts has so far been affected by flood in Bihar. The number of affected families is 16.60 lakh. All possible help is being provided to these families,

The government on Wednesday decided to make Chhattisgarh a hub for film shooting and encourage producers to shoot in the state.

by

This decisionin was taken at a cabinet meeting held at the residence of Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel.

The cabinet also decided to provide grants to national award winning films shot in Chhattisgarh.

As grant of maximum of Rs 1 crore would be given to award winners in any of the categories: best film, best director, best actor, best actress and for promoting national integration or carrying a social message.

The ambitious Rs 45,000 crore Ken-Betwa river link project, which has been pending for the last 16 years, will be inaugurated by PM Narendra Modi in November, Madhya Pradesh Water Resources Minister Tulsiram Silawat told.

by

The Centre, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh governments have reached a consensus on the project, said Silawat. He, however, said linking the project to UP Assembly polls slated to be held next year was not be appropriate as the inauguration was only aimed to address water needs of the two states.

Silawat further said since there were no more pending issues between the two states, the link project work will resume from November.

The Ken-Betwa project was mooted in 2005 to meet the water needs of the parched Bundelkhand region, which is spread across MP and UP borders. The scheme though has been embroiled in several issues for the last 16 years.

After lengthy negotiations on several issues, including water-sharing ratio, the two states and the Centre had signed the MoU on March 22 this year. As part of the project, surplus water of river Ken in MP will be transferred to river Betwa in UP for irrigating 3.64 lakh hectares in Bundelkhand. The projects involved construction of a 77 metre-tall and 2 km-wide Dhaudhan dam and a 230 km canal.

Gujarat has third-highest ratio of vehicles per family

by

Gujarats major cities are staring at a bleak, bumper-to-bumper ride in a proximate future. Reason, eachGujarathousehold owns more than twovehicles an Average 2.25 vehicle per household which is the third highest after Goas 4.41 vehicles per household and Delhis 3.62 vehicles per household.

The National Road Transport Yearbook 2019-2020 of the Union ministry of road transport and highways (MoRTH) reveals that as on March 31, 2021, the state has 2.75 crore registered vehicles. One of the major reasons, say experts, is poor public transport system in cities. Less bus frequency in a big number of villages and the culture of multi-tasking in Gujarat which prompts people to buy their own vehicle instead of depending on public transport.

Gujarat along with Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Nadu account for nearly 49% of the total vehicles registered in India. Maharashtra has the highest share of 12% followed by UP (11.1%), Tamil Nadu (10.2%), Gujarat (8.5%) and Karnataka (7.2%).