Centre sanctions Rs 68 crore under TRSP in HP

Shimla, Aug 3 (UNI) Himachal Pradesh Revenue Minister Sat Mahajan today said the Centre has sanctioned projects worth Rs 68 crore under the Total Rural Sanitation Programme (TRSP) for six districts of the state.

Talking to newspersons here, he said the remaining six districts would be included under the programme in September this year and would make Himachal one of the cleanest states in the country.

Mr Mahajan said the projects had been sanctioned for Chamba, Hamirpur, Kangra, Kullu, Mandi and Sirmaur districts, while the decision to include the remaining six districts would be taken at a meeting to held at Delhi sometime in September later this year.

The thrust of the campaign was to accelerate the cleanliness drive and make the state free from open defecation, he said.

He said the Himachal Government launched a scheme for giving grant-in-aid every year to the best performing panchayats for construction of rainwater harvesting structures.

''The best performing gram panchayat at the state level will be given Rs five lakh, while the best performing panchayat at the district level will be given Rs two lakh and best performing panchayat at the block level will be given Rs one lakh.'' The state Revenue Minister said to strengthen the gram sabha, it had been mandatory that village level functionaries of agriculture, animal husbandry, primary education, forest, health and family welfare, horticulture, irrigation and public health, revenue and welfare departments would attend the meetings of the gram sabha.

Besides, it had also been made mandatory that the agenda of the gram sabha meetings would be prepared and circulated to the members at least 15 days prior to the meeting and the gram panchayat would have two mandatory standing committees, a work committee and a budget committee.

Referring to the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), he said it was being implemented in Chamba, Sirmaur, Kangra and Mandi districts of the state and from February 2006 to June this year, about 1.58 lakh lakh job cards had been issued to registered wage employment seekers.

Mr Mahajan said the watershed development programme had been highly successful in the state to control irregular water flow in the rainy season, revival of natural resources, increase in horticulture, forest, fodder and ground water table, besides providing employment to the needy people of the rural areas of the state.

He said to ensure the identification of poor eligible families in the below poverty level (BPL) list, clear cut guidelines had been issued to the deputy commissioners of all the districts of the state and out of 3243 panchayats in the state, the lists had been approved in all but one panchayat.

UNI