• 11 May 2023

Campaign for the benefit of PMKSNY to 100% Food Providers of the state

Why in News?

According to the information received from the media on 10 May 2023, the state government is going to start a big campaign to provide the benefit of 'Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana' to 100 percent food providers of Uttar Pradesh, in which cases of old registered farmers and new farmers will also be added.

Key Points:

• PM farmer beneficiary satiation campaign will be run in the entire state. In this campaign, officers and employees of the Agriculture Department including the Revenue Department, Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Department will be deployed.
• At the Gram Panchayat level, this campaign will start on May 22 and will continue till June 10.
• However, before this, the officials of the state government have to go door-to-door till May 20 to prepare a list of such farmers, who are still deprived of taking advantage of this scheme due to various reasons.
• Before the campaign at the Gram Panchayat level, a house-to-house survey and publicity campaign will be conducted. In this, a house-to-house survey will be done with the village-level personnel under the leadership of the Gram Pradhan and a list of such farmers who are deprived of this benefit due to various reasons will be prepared.
• The Agriculture Department will be the nodal of this entire campaign. Representatives of Gram Pradhan, Village Development Officer, Panchayat Secretary, Lekhpal, Technical Assistant (Agriculture), Common Service Center, and Post Office will be present in the camps organized at Gram Panchayat level, so that the e-KYC, Aadhaar linking of bank account and Land seeding work can be done successfully.
• It is known that under the 'Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana', an amount of Rs 6000 per year is sent directly to the bank account of the farmers.
• On the instructions of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, Chief Secretary Durgashankar Mishra is directly monitoring it.
• There are a large number of farmers in the state who have not yet applied for open source. Apart from this, there are farmers who have applied under open source, but the applications have not been accepted yet.
• Along with this, the farmers whose land account has not been updated, are also not getting the upcoming instalments. Despite the verification of the land account of registered farmers many times, such a situation is arising due to the non-linking of their bank account with Aadhaar.
• It is worth mentioning that under 'Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana', distribution of 13 instalments has been completed so far. Now e-KYC has been made mandatory for the 14th instalment.

On the lines of MP, Aadhaar is now mandatory for Land Registry in Bihar

Why in News?

According to the information received from the media on 10 May 2023, Aadhaar authentication will now be mandatory for buying-selling land and houses in Bihar on the lines of Madhya Pradesh. In this regard, K.K. Pathak, Additional Chief Secretary of State Liquor Prohibition, Excise and Registration Department has issued an order.

Key Points:

• Due to the mandatory Aadhaar authentication in the state, anonymous transactions of properties will be stopped. At the same time, the correct identification of the buyer-seller will also be easier with Aadhaar number authentication, which will prevent fraud.
• It is known that earlier the case of the land registry by setting up a fake person used to come to the fore, now there will be a complete ban on this.
• Due to mandatory Aadhaar authentication, the unnecessary crowd in the registry offices in the state will also reduce.
• After the instructions issued from the departmental level, now the requirement of witness and identification with the buyer & seller during the land registry will also end. The registry office will complete the witness and identification process only through Aadhaar authentication.

Rajasthani Migrants living in Delhi got the gift of Important Yojana

Why in News?

On 10 May 2023, Shubhra Singh, Chief Resident Commissioner & Additional Chief Secretary, Government of Rajasthan and Dheeraj Srivastava, Resident Commissioner & Commissioner of Rajasthan Foundation, inaugurated 'Mukhyamantri Nishulk Dava Yojana' & 'E-Mitra' Yojana at Bikaner House premises in Delhi to provide benefits of the public welfare schemes of the state government to the Rajasthani migrants living in Delhi.

Key Points:

• People will get 300 medicines free of cost under the 'Mukhyamantri Nishulk Dava Yojana'.
• Apart from this, about 500 special services will be provided by the E-Mitra centre opened in Bikaner House, mainly including Janadhar, Enrollment, Chiranjeevi Enrollment, Pension Verification, Scholarship Yojana, Mobile Recharge, Bus-Rail Tickets, Birth-Death Proof etc.
• It is worth mentioning that the people living in the state, as well as the Rajasthani migrants living outside the state, should get the benefit of Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot's positive thinking and priority on education & health. With this resolve, these facility centres have been started.
• Along with the inauguration of E-Mitra and Mukhyamantri Nishulk Dava Yojana centres in Bikaner House premises, a press room was inaugurated for the journalists to sit. Along with seating facilities for journalists, computers and other facilities have also been started in this room, so that media persons can complete their daily work related to news.

Madhya Pradesh Seed Association will take membership of Indian Seed Cooperative Society

Why in News?

On 9 May 2023, in the meeting of the Board of Directors of the State Seed Producers & Marketing Association held at the Ministry under the chairmanship of Madhya Pradesh Cooperative & Public Service Management Minister Dr. Arvind Singh Bhadoria and in the special presence of Farmers-Welfare & Agriculture Development Minister Kamal Patel. It was decided to take membership in the Indian Seed Cooperative Society by the State Seed Association.

Key Points:

• The Board of Directors approved the membership of the Seed Association to 16 primary seed producer cooperatives.
• Along with this, it was also decided to get wire fencing done for security in the godown-cum-grading plant built by the State Seed Association.
• MD of Seed Association A.K. Singh said that in the year 2022-23, the progress of lifting and distribution of breeder seeds was recorded by the Seed Association from various research institutes of the country and the state, more than 455 quintals in Kharif year 2022 and 898 quintals for Rabi year 2022-23.
• It is worth mentioning that the campaign to increase the seed replacement rate and formation of the primary seed producer cooperative society was started in the year 2002 for seed production as per the demand of the local level.
• Madhya Pradesh State Cooperative Seed Producers and Marketing Federation (Seed Association) was formed on 13 December 2004 to coordinate the seed producer cooperatives in seed production and marketing.
• The main objective of the Seed Association is to provide breeder and foundation seeds to the Primary Seed Producer Societies according to their local requirements and to make available high-quality seeds at the appropriate time to the farmers of the state by getting certified seeds produced from the Seed Society.
• After the formation of the Seed Association, in the year 2004-05, production of 1.64 lakh quintals of certified seeds was started from an area of 16,000 hectares through the registered seed producer societies of the state.

Release of Medical Books written in Hindi

Why in News?

On 9 May 2023, the Higher Education Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Dr. Mohan Yadav released various books in the release program of Medical Science Books in the mother tongue Hindi organized by Atal Bihari Vajpayee Hindi University and Madhya Pradesh State Livestock & Poultry Development Corporation.

Key Points:

• The released books 'Dialysis Technician', 'Operating Theater Technician' and 'X-ray Technician' have been authored by Dr. Ganeshram Mehar.
• While the books ‘Parichayatmak Rog Vikriti Vigynan aur Adhunik Naidanik Jaanchen’ have been written by Dr. Premchand Savarnkar and ‘Panch Karma Chikitsa ke Adaharbhut Siddhant’ by Dr. Suresh Tiwari and ‘Manav Sharir Rachna Vigynan’ by Dr. AK Dwivedi.
• It is worth mentioning that in the National Education Policy 2020, importance is being given to mother tongue, regional language, Indian languages, translation and professional courses.
• In Madhya Pradesh, the work of writing and translating books of technical-professional courses like medicine in Hindi is going on.
• This innovation done by Madhya Pradesh Hindi Granth Academy and Atal Bihari Vajpayee Hindi University, Bhopal is commendable.
• It is known that Madhya Pradesh is the first state in the country which has started medical education in Hindi as well. On 16 October 2022, Union Home and Cooperation Minister Amit Shah released MBBS first-year Hindi books in Bhopal.

A department named State Audit Directorate will be formed in Haryana

Why in News?

The Haryana Cabinet, which met under the chairmanship of Chief Minister Manohar Lal on 9 May 2023, has decided to set up a new department called State Audit Directorate under the administrative control of the Finance Department to ensure transparency and accountability in public expenditure.

Key Points:

• The State Audit Directorate will conduct an internal audit of all auditable entities, departments, boards, corporations, co-operative societies, universities, local authorities, statutory bodies, public institutions and other authorities established, controlled or funded by the State Government.
• These include non-governmental organizations receiving funds, aids, grants or contributions from the Consolidated Fund and institutions that receive funds in any form from the government or publicly through the State Consolidated Fund, are also included in this audit.
• An internal audit is an adequate and effective tool for reviewing & improving internal control, identifying weaknesses & errors, evaluating & monitoring as well as checking for internal control.

Cabinet approves new Excise Policy 2023-24

Why in News?

New Excise Policy 2023-24 has been approved in the cabinet meeting chaired by Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal on 9 May 2023.

Key Points:

• It is worth mentioning that in the last two years, 100 percent recovery of the license fee on which the retail shops were allotted has been done by the state government.
• The new Excise Policy 2023-24 also provides the facility to generate resources, which can be used for funding developmental projects.
• As an environment-friendly measure, the new policy aims to phase out the use of PET bottles in liquor bottling after 29 February 2024.
• Along with this, a retail permit fee has been imposed with a targeted collection of Rs 400 crore. This amount will be used for environmental and animal welfare.
• Reiterating the state government's commitment towards environment protection and animal welfare (gau seva), a retail permit fee has been imposed in the new policy, which aims to collect Rs 400 crore. This amount will be used for environmental and animal welfare.
• In the new policy, the label of IFL (BIO) will also be updated at the district level for ease of doing business. Also, to promote the MSME sector, the license fee for small (craft) breweries has been reduced. To promote wineries in the state, the supervisory fee of wineries has been reduced.
• In the new excise policy, the maximum number of retail liquor contracts in the state has been reduced from 2600 to 2500 in 2022-23 and 2500 to 2400 in 2023-24 respectively.
• Along with this, taking another major decision from the point of view of public welfare, it has been decided that liquor shops will not be opened in the notified holy areas around Shri Mata Mansa Devi Temple in Panchkula and in the villages where Gurukuls are running.
• In the current policy, the size of retail liquor sale zones has also been reduced from 4 to 2 to allow more participants to apply for liquor shop licenses through e-tendering.
• The new policy has increased the basic quota for domestic liquor, foreign liquor made in India and imported foreign liquor (BIO). Along with this, excise duty on domestic liquor and IMFL has also been marginally increased.
• In order to promote low-alcohol beverages, excise duty has been reduced on ready-to-drink beverages and beer under mild & super-mild categories. In addition, the license fee for the pub category (L-10E) i.e. for consumption of only beer and wine has been further reduced.
• In the new policy, the provisions of fines have been tightened to curb the piracy of liquor by the wholesale licensees and there will be a complete ban on advertisements of liquor promotion by the licensee on various platforms including social media.
• Caution boards will be displayed outside all hotels, pubs and bars, restaurants and cafes serving liquor under excise license. Further, to ensure the safety of employees and customers, it will be mandatory for all retailers in urban areas, taverns and wholesale licensees to install fire fighting equipment. CCTV cameras will also be installed in all the above shops/godowns.

3 Martyred Soldiers of Chhattisgarh got Kirti Chakra for their Supreme Sacrifices

Why in News?

On 9 May 2023, President Draupadi Murmu awarded Kirti Chakra to three martyr soldiers of Chhattisgarh for their supreme courage and sacrifice in the Naxal operation.

Key Points:

• President Murmu presented Kirti Chakra to Prantika Bhardwaj, wife of Martyr Sub-Inspector Deepak Bhardwaj, Sushila Sodhi, wife of Martyr Head Constable Sodhi Narayan, Dutika Kashyap, wife of Martyr STF head constable Martyr Shravan Kashyap in a function organized at Rashtrapati Bhavan.
• These three soldiers have been honoured by the President with Kirti Chakra for their supreme courage and sacrifice in the Naxal operation in the Bijapur district of the Bastar region.
• Significantly, sub-inspector Martyr Deepak Bhardwaj was a resident of Pehrid of Malkharoda in Janjgir-Champa district of Chhattisgarh, constable Sodhi Narayan of Bijapur district Punur and STF head constable Martyr Shravan Kashyap of Baniya village of Bastar district.

CM launches Automatic Number Plate Recognition System (ANPR)

Why in News?

On 9 May 2023, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami inaugurated the Automatic Number Plate Recognition System (ANPR) prepared by the Transport Department from the Secretariat.

Key Points:

• The automatic number plate recognition system will facilitate compliance with traffic rules and online monitoring of tax evasion cases on major roads of the state.
• Installation of ANPR cameras will also help GST & other departments and prevention of tax evasion will also be possible through this. With this, there will be freedom from jams at check posts and traffic will also be easy. Along with this, the introduction of this system will also help in preventing vehicle accidents.
• Secretary Transport Arvind Singh Hayanki informed through a presentation that by amending the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, arrangements have been made for electronic monitoring of vehicles by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, Government of India.
• All the check posts established on the state border in Uttarakhand have been abolished. In order to implement the electronic monitoring system in the state, in the first phase, ANPR will be started on the state border. A plan has been made to set up for which an amount of Rs 4.61 crore has been sanctioned from the State Road Safety Fund.
• Uttarakhand Transport Secretary informed that under this scheme, the process of integration has been started to make the data received from the ANPR portal available to the GST department, while other departments – mining, excise, tourism, urban development, Integration with Forest Department and Police are also proposed so that the data obtained through a single medium can be used by all the concerned departments.
• This system has been made fully automated, for which the software prepared for ANPR cameras has been integrated with VAHAN Portal and E-Challan Portal. With this, challans will be automatically generated on the basis of the number plate of the vehicle, in which there will be no human intervention.