Government Committees, Schemes & Bills - Current Affairs for March, 2016

This index was launched to mark the next chapter of the flagship campaign, Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan . Index was launched by Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu, Union Ministry for Urban Devekioment, Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation and Parliamentary Affairs.

• Inclusiveness and accessibility index is to help companies participate in the Accessible India campaign by examining how accessible the workplace is to PwD
• 3rd December 2015 marks the International Day of Persons with Disabilities
• Index aims at assessing inclusiveness and accessibility of persons with disabilities by an organisation.

Central government is implementing Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan for providing financial support to proposals contained in the State Higher Education Plan approved by State Higher Education Councils to attain the objective of equity, access and quality. 115 universities and 1218 colleges have been approved by RUSA PAB for infrastructure gains.

This FSSAI project will raise the safety standards of foods sold on streets across the capital city of New Delhi by training 20,000 roadside vendors on aspects of health and hygiene, in the first phase. FSSAI will partner with Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship under the Recognition of Prior Learning under the PMKVY scheme for this project.

National LED programme called Ujala with the target of replacing 77 crore incandescent maps across 12 states with light bulbs will give a successful lease of life to DELP. As part of this programme, nearly 7.47 crore LED bulbs have been distributed across the nation resulting in energy saving of more than 2.66 crore kWh each year and reducing 21,550 tonnes of CO2 per day which will have cost savings of INR 10.64 crore each day.

Biometric data of around 99 crore Indians has been encrypted so far under the Aadhar scheme. IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has announced that there are currently 99 crore Indians on Aadhar. In case of DBT or Direct Benefit Transfer Scheme, INR 15,000 core was saved and for PDF, INR 2346 crore was saved within 4 states. Regarding privacy, all care has been taken, the minister announced.

Celebrating women leaders from India, NITI Aayog has launched the ‘Women Transforming India’ initiative on, March 8, International Women’s Day, in partnership with the UN in India and MyGov.
Niti Aayog is seeking powerful women narratives through this initiative which will encourage and recognise women who have made a difference.

Cabinet has approved the INR 8000 crore scheme to provide cooking gas connections free of cost to lady members of poor households. The Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana has been approved for a period of three years and aims to provide LPG connections to women members of BPL families. The scheme will be continued for 2 more years to cover a total of 5 crore BPL households.

The race to join UDAY just added one more state- Punjab which has become the 7th state to join the UDAY scheme for the revival of discos. It will help to save INR 5475 crore within the next three years of the programme. Other 2 states which also signed up to join the scheme are AP and Haryana. Once Punjab joined the UDAY scheme, close to INR 1.6 lakh crore debt of discos have been covered under the programme which has sought to revive struggling power discoms. Once Punjab has signed the agreement, close to INR 1.6 lakh crore debt of discoms have been covered through pact, which is close to 37% of the total outstanding INR 4.3 lakh crore in the nation. Agreement was signed so that state electricity department can save up to INR 600 crore on account of interest saving alone. The aim is to make Punjab a power surplus state. Under the scheme, it is envisaged that aggregate technical and commercial transmission losses will burn in additional revenue, apart from efforts to improve operational efficiency.

Union Government has constituted a committee to provide ST status to 6 Assamese communities namely Tai Ahom, Chutia, Koch Rajbongshi, Moran, Matak and Adivasi to be led by Mahesh Kumar Singla, Special Secretary (Internal Security) Ministry of Home Affairs.

The Ek Bharat Shrestha Bharat programme will be launched in States and Districts in an annual programme that connects people though exchanges in areas of language, trade, culture, travel and tourism. The programme aims to create closer interactions between districts and states in a phased, structured manner.