Page 2 - Centre

SC permits Centre to issue directions on fumigation of aircraft in country

The Supreme Court on Wednesday permitted the Centre to issues directions on fumigation of aircraft in pursuance of the recommendations of a high-powered panel on the issue and keeping in mind the health and safety of passengers and crew members. A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and justices P S Narasimha and J B Pardiwala took note of the submissions of Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati that the Ministry of Civil Aviation has accepted the recommendations of the panel on disinsection of aircraft before taking off and landing. "Since the matter engaged the attention of the central government which has accepted the recommendation of the high-powered committee. We now permit the Union government to issue the directions in this regard keeping in mind the health and safety of passengers and crew members of aircraft," the bench ordered while disposing of the plea filed by Interglobe Aviation Ltd. The firm has been engaged in the work of fumigation of aircraft at

Centre to borrow 57.55% of its full-year target in H1FY24: FinMin

The government borrowing programme is scheduled to be completed in 26 weekly tranches of Rs 31,000-39,000 crore each

Mamata on 2-day dharna to protest Centre's 'discrimination' against Bengal

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said the two-day sit-in that she started here on Wednesday to protest the BJP-led Union government's alleged discriminatory attitude against the state was on behalf of her party, Trinamool Congress, and not on part of the state government. Stating that she is doing a "double duty" (as West Bengal chief minister and TMC supremo), Banerjee showed a copy of the Constitution at the protest site and said that the demonstration is also to "save India, save democracy". "People were asking me whether I am demonstrating on behalf of the state government or the Trinamool Congress. I would like to tell them that I have two responsibilities. I am the CM of West Bengal and also the TMC chairperson. So, as a chief minister when I see the people of my state suffer, it's my responsibility to look into that. "Since this is the government of the TMC, I will say that I am conducting this demonstration on behalf of my party and not for the state government. Yo

Centre directed to block over 30,000 web links since 2018: Vaishnaw

The government issued directions to block 30,310 web links, including social media links, accounts, channels, pages, apps, web pages, websites etc since 2018, Parliament was informed on Wednesday. Electronics and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Wednesday informed the Lok Sabha that the committee constituted under IT Rules examined a total of 41,172 URLs (Uniform Resource Locators) that were received from nodal officers in various ministries, departments and states for blocking under section 69A of IT Act 2000. "The Government follows due process as envisaged in the Information Technology (Procedure and Safeguards for Blocking for Access of Information for Public) Rules, 2009. From 2018 till 15th March 2023, blocking directions have been given for 30,310 URLs. These include social media URLs, accounts, channels, pages, apps, web pages, websites etc," Vaishnaw said in a written statement. He said that section 69A of the Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000, provides power to the ...

472 prisoners sentenced to death as on Dec 31, 2021: Centre to Rajya Sabha

As many as 472 prisoners lodged in different jails across the country were sentenced to death and waiting for the next course of action as on December 31, 2021, Rajya Sabha was informed on Wednesday. Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Kumar Mishra also said that death sentence of 290 other prisoners have been commuted to life imprisonment. The highest number of convicts (total 67), who were awarded death penalty, were lodged in Uttar Pradesh, followed by 46 in Bihar, 44 in Maharashtra, 39 in Madhya Pradesh, 37 in West Bengal, 31 in Jharkhand and 27 in Karnataka, he said replying to a written question. The minister said among the 290 prisoners whose death sentence have been commuted to life imprisonment, 46 were in jails in Madhya Pradesh, 35 in Maharashtra, 32 in Uttar Pradesh, 30 in Bihar, 19 each in Karnataka and West Bengal and 18 in Gujarat.

Centre working to reduce logistics cost to GDP to 7.5% in 5 years: Shah

The government is working to bring down logistics cost to GDP to 7.5 per cent from the current 13 per cent, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said Tuesday. Addressing the annual session of Assocham, Shah said, without the development of the country's infrastructure and reduction of logistics costs, development was not possible. The logistics cost in India is 13 per cent to the GDP as compared eight per cent in the rest of the world, making it difficult for Indian exports to compete globally, he said. "We will have to remove the eight per cent and 13 per cent gap. We have formulated a framework for the next five years. I can assure you that we will reach 7.5 per cent logistics cost in the next five years," he said. Shah said the Narendra Modi government has made a plan of Rs 100 lakh crore investment in infrastructure with some mega projects such as the doubling of railway lines, their widening, dedicated freight corridors from Mumbai to Delhi and Amritsar to Kolkata besides 11 other ..

Central govt IT system to start supporting email in Hindi in 2 years

All IT systems in the central government will start supporting email communications in hindi scripts in the next two years, a senior official said on Monday. While speaking at the Universal Acceptance (UA) Day curtain raiser event, Ministry of Electronics and IT Additional Secretary Bhuvnesh Kumar said that the work has started to make 15 ministry's website UA-compliant and content on them is being made available in hindi. "Resolver to facilitate e-mail communications in local language script will be done over a period of 2 years. Initially it will support Hindi script and later other languages will be added," Kumar said. He said that the Centre is encouraging the state governments to provide content in the local languages. Global internet body ICANN has been supporting Universal Acceptance that aims to address issues around language barriers that check people from connecting to the internet. The internet has been dominated by the English language which prevents several non-Englis

Centre gets time from HC to reply on plea on approach to medical education

The Delhi High Court on Monday granted more time to several Union ministries to file their replies to a petition for the adoption of an "Indian holistic approach" in medical education and practice, instead of the "colonial segregated way" of having different streams of allopathy, ayurveda, yoga and homeopathy. A bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Sachin Datta gave six weeks to the ministries of health and family welfare, women and child development, home affairs and law and justice to file their responses to the petition. The bench listed the matter for further hearing on July 6. During the hearing, the counsel for the Union Ayush ministry said they have already filed their reply on record. "Reply has been filed by respondent no. 2 (Ayush ministry) only. Other respondents have not filed their replies. Let others also file it within six weeks," the court said. The petition filed by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay claimed that the adoption of a holistic approac

What is World Freedom Index and why Indian govt keeps rejecting its report?

India's position in the 2022 World Press Freedom Index dropped to 150 out of 180 countries, according to Reporters Without Borders

Centre developing 60 jetties along Ganga from Varanasi to Haldia: Minister

The Centre is developing 60 jetties on the banks of Ganga between Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh and Haldia in West Bengal, Union MoS for Shipping and Waterways Shantanu Thakur said on Sunday. Inaugurating four such jetties on both sides of the river at Nadia's Kalyani and Tribeny in Hooghly district of West Bengal, he said the Centre was also developing 118 waterways in the country. "The 118 new waterways will reduce distance, lower transportation costs and benefit small traders, daily passengers and students. It will strengthen the economy," he said. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is focussing on the infrastructure development of the country which has been neglected for a long, he said. "We want the cooperation of the West Bengal government for infrastructure development as the state needs it," he said. Thakur said the four jetties he inaugurated were built at a cost of Rs 8 crore. He also initiated various development along the Ichamati river -- National Waterway 44, in the North 24

Previously neglected areas now role models for country, says Jitendra Singh

Union Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh on Sunday said areas like border districts which were neglected earlier have now become role model for the country. He said bringing governance at the doorsteps of the people to the last man in the last queue is possible only under Narendra Modi whose endeavour, after being sworn in as the Prime Minister of India in 2014, has been to address the people's issues on the spot through 'public darbars' with district administration. The governance cannot be restricted to the district headquarters only and a departure from this practice was necessary so that people's issues could be addressed on the spot with district administration, Singh said at a 'public darbar' here. He asserted that development has reached the last man in the queue under PM Narendra Modi, and said the areas which were neglected earlier like the border districts under the previous governments have now become the role models for the country, the best example being the

Keep close watch on evolving etiologies: Centre issues advisory on Covid

The advisory has also flagged low level of testing by states and UTs and has said that testing levels are insufficient as compared to the standards prescribed by WHO i.e 140 tests per million

Govt hikes DA, DR for central govt employees to 42% of basic pay

The move will benefit about 4.8 million central government employees and 6.9 million pensioners. The decision will be effective from 1 January, 2023

Centre clears third electronics manufacturing cluster for Karnataka

The Centre has cleared the third electronics manufacturing cluster for Karnataka, which will be set up in the Dharwad district, Minister of State of Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said on Friday. According to the documents shared by the minister on Twitter, the electronics manufacturing cluster (EMC) project will cover an area of 224.5 acre at a cost of over Rs 179 crore, comprising central financial assistance of over Rs 89 crore. "Today a new Electronics Manufacturing Cluster in Hubli Dharwad is also approved - further expanding Karnataka's leadership in Electronics," Chandrasekhar said in a tweet. The EMC will be spread over two villages of Kotura and Belura, covering an area of 88.48 and 136.02 acre, respectively. An official statement mentioned that the government expects the new greenfield EMC is likely to catalyse investments of over Rs 1,500 crore in the near future and generate employment for over 18,000 people. "9 companies and start-ups have already committed t

Bengal, Rajasthan among 9 states to withdraw general consent to CBI: Centre

Nine states, including Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and West Bengal, have withdrawn general consent to the CBI to probe cases, Union Minister Jitendra Singh said on Thursday. According to Section 6 of the Delhi Special Police Establishment (DSPE) Act, 1946, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) needs the consent from the respective state government for conducting investigation in its jurisdiction, he informed the Rajya Sabha through a written reply. In terms of the provision of Section 6 of the DSPE Act, 1946, a general consent to the CBI has been granted by state governments for investigation of specified class of offences against specified categories of persons enabling the agency to register and investigate those specified matters, said Singh, the Minister of State for Personnel. Nine states -- Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Kerala, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Punjab, Rajasthan, Telangana and West Bengal -- have withdrawn general consent to the CBI to investigate cases, he said.

SYL canal: SC tells Centre to play 'pro-active role' to resolve dispute

The Supreme Court on Thursday told the Centre that being the main arbiter in water dispute between two states, it is required to play a more "pro-active role instead of being a mute spectator" and asked the Punjab and Haryana governments to hold discussions to resolve the Satluj-Yamuna Link (SYL) canal dispute. During the hearing, the Punjab government told the top court that they have huge scarcity of water with water tables going down in the rivers and there is "no point building canals like a Taj Mahal", with no water flowing through it. The Haryana government, on the other hand, told the apex court that its people need water which comes from Punjab, which has to abide by the decree for construction of a canal in its jurisdictional area. A bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Ahsanuddin Amanullah and Aravind Kumar said, "We expect the endeavours of the States to sit together to still find a solution is the way forward and we call upon the States to hold meetings, not frequently

Parliament must function: Cong MP Tewari slams Centre over adjournment

Congress MP Manish Tewari on Wednesday hit out at the Centre over premature adjournment of the ongoing Budget session and said that it is the duty of the government to make the Parliament function

More than 2,170,000 EVs registered in India; Uttar Pradesh tops list

Over 2,170,000 electric vehicles registered in India, Uttar Pradesh topped the list with 4,65,432 EVs, followed by Maharashtra and Delhi with 2,26,134 and 2,03,263 respectively, the government said

Centre releases guidelines for human-wildlife conflict mitigation

The 10 species-specific guidelines include, guidelines for mitigating human-elephant, -gaur, -leopard, -snake, -crocodile, -rhesus macaque, -wild pig, -bear, -blue bull and -blackbuck conflict

Naxal violence down by 77% over past decade: Center informs Lok Sabha

The violence perpetrated by Naxals has come down by 77 per cent in just over a decade while casualties of the security forces and civilians have also declined by 90 per cent, Lok Sabha was informed on Tuesday. Union Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai said the geographical spread of violence has significantly reduced and only 176 police stations of 45 districts reported Left Wing Extremism violence in 2022 as compared to a high of 465 police stations of 96 districts in 2010. "The number of LWE related violent incidents have come down by 77 per cent in 2022 in comparison to the high of 2010. The number of resultant deaths (security forces and civilians) have also reduced by 90 per cent from an all time high of 1005 in 2010 to 98 in 2022," he said replying to a written question. The minister said the decline in geographical spread is also reflected in the reduced number of districts covered under Security Related Expenditure (SRE) Scheme. Number of SRE districts reduced from 126