Establishment of Solar Cities

Establishment of Solar Cities

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) is implementing a programme on ‘Development of Solar Cities’. This was stated by Shri. Piyush Goyal, Minister of State (I/C) for Power, Coal & New and Renewable Energy in a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha today.  60  existing cities are planned to be developed as solar cities. 55 solar cities have already been taken up so far. The State/UT-wise list of the Cities identified for developing as Solar Cities is given below:- List of Solar Cities proposed, State/UT-wise SL. No State Cities for which in-principle approval given 1 Andhra Pradesh Vijaywada Mahbubnagar* 2 Assam Guwahati Jorhat 3 Arunachal Pradesh Itanagar 4 Chandigarh Chandigarh 5 Chhattisgarh Bilaspur Raipur 6 Gujarat  Rajkot Gandhinagar Surat 7 Goa Panji City 8 Haryana Gurgaon Faridabad 9 Himachal Pradesh Shimla Hamirpur 10 Karnataka Mysore Hubli-Dharwad 11 Kerala Thiruvananthapuram* Kochi* 12 Maharashtra Nagpur Thane Kalyan-Dombivli Aurangabad Nanded Shirdi 13 Madhya Pradesh Indore Gwalior Bhopal* Rewa 14 Manipur Imphal 15 Mizoram Aizawl 16 Nagaland Kohima Dimapur 17 Delhi New Delhi (NDMC area) 18 Orissa Bhubaneswar 19 Punjab Amritsar Ludhiana SAS Nagar (Mohali) 20 Rajasthan Ajmer Jaipur* Jodhpur 21 Tamil Nadu Coimbatore 22 Tripura Agartala 23 Uttarakhand Dehradun Haridwar & Rishikesh Chamoli –Gopeshwar 24 Uttar Pradesh Agra Moradabad Allahabad 25 West Bengal Howrah Madhyamgram New Town Kolkata 26 Jammu & Kashmir Leh* 27 Puducherry Puducherry * In-principle approval given only.

Extension of financial assistance for setting up food processing units in North Eastern States during XII Plan

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA), chaired by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, has approved the inclusion of all North Eastern States for setting up food processing units within the Sub scheme of the Horticulture Mission for North East & Himalayan States (HMNEH) of the Integrated Mission for Development of Horticulture (MIDH). North Eastern States, which are horticulturally rich, will be able to take up projects on food processing industries, thus enabling better shelf life and value addition of produce. The programme for setting up food processing units will cover all States in the North East and the Himalayan Region of the country. The total expenditure of Rs. 16,840 crore has been envisaged for implementing MIDH during the XII Plan. This includes Rs. 15,794 crore as Government of India share out of which Rs. 3000 crore is for the HMNEH sub scheme. Expenditure on setting up food processing units in the North Eastern States will be met within this provision. Background: MIDH was launched during 2014-15 by subsuming six ongoing schemes of the Department of Agriculture & Cooperation on horticulture development viz. three Centrally Sponsored Schemes of the National Horticulture Mission (NHM), Horticulture Mission for North East & Himalayan States (HMNEH), National Bamboo Mission (NBM), and three Central Sector Schemes viz. National Horticulture Board (NHB), Coconut Development Board (CDB) and Central Institute for Horticulture CCIH) Nagaland. The interventions under MIDH include production and productivity improvement programmes along with infrastructure development for post harvest management, food processing and markets. While launching MIDH, food processing component was included only in the Himalayan States of Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir and Uttarakhand, within HMNEH. This was on the presumption that funds earmarked by the Ministry of Food Processing Industries (MOFPI) for setting up food processing units in North Eastern States will be available for the purpose. However, the scheme of MOFPI on Technology Upgradation, under which funds were released to the North Eastern States for setting up food processing units, was discontinued with effect from 2014-15. It has therefore been decided to include the North Eastern States for availing assistance for setting up food processing units within the ambit of MIDH.

Interest subvention to Public Sector Banks, Private Sector Banks, Cooperative Banks, RRBs, NABARD for providing short term crop loan to farmers

The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, today gave its approval to the following: 1. To continue interest subvention to Public Sector Banks (PSBs), Private Sector Banks, Regional Rural Banks (RRBs), Cooperatives Banks and National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) to enable them to provide short-term crop loans up to Rs.3 lakh to farmers at 7 per annum during the year 2014-15. 2. To provide additional interest subvention of 3 percent per annum to those farmers who repay on time, that is within one year of disbursement of their short-term crop loans taken during the year 2014-15. 3. To permit the release of Rs. 18,583 crore as interest subvention for 2014-15 of which Rs. 4399 crore subvention to NABARD for refinance to Cooperatives Banks and RRBs and Rs.14,184 crore to Public Sector Banks, Private Sector Banks, RRBs and Cooperative Banks for subvention on their own funds. 4. To provide interest subvention to small and marginal farmers having Kisan Credit Cards for loan against negotiable warehouse receipts for post harvest at 7 percent per annum. interest for a period of six months that is at the same rates as applicable for crop loans as given in the para (1) above. 5. To permit the release of Rs. 321 crore as interest subvention to small and marginal farmers having Kisan Credit Cards against negotiable warehouse receipts, for post-harvest. 6. To provide relief to farmers affected by natural calamities, the interest subvention of two percent will continue to be available to banks for the first year on the restructured amount. Such restructured loans may attract normal rate of interest from the second year onwards as per the policy laid down by the RBI. Background The Government of India has since 2006-07 been subsidizing short-term crop loans to farmers in order to ensure the availability of crop loans to farmers for loans upto Rs.three lakh at seven percent per annum. This interest subvention scheme has been further continued for 2014-15 for PSBs, Private Sector Banks, RRBs and Cooperative Banks. In the year 2009-10, an additional subvention of 1 percent was provided to farmers who repay their loans on time. This has been increased from 2 percent in 2010-11 to 3 percent in 2011-12, 2012-13 and 2013-14. Thus, the effective rate of interest for such prompt-payee farmers is four percent. Banks have been consistently meeting the target set for agriculture credit flow in the past years. For the year 2014-15, the target for agricultural credit flow has been raised to Rs.8,00,000 crore from Rs. 7,00,000 crore in the year 2013-14.

Implementation of scheme for development of Solar Parks and Ultra Mega Solar Power Projects

The Union Cabinet, chaired by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, today approved the scheme for setting up 25 solar parks each with a capacity of 500 MW and above and Ultra Mega Solar Power Projects in various parts of the country where large chunks of land can be spared for this purpose. These parks will be able to accommodate over 20,000 MW of solar power projects. The Solar Parks/ Ultra Mega Solar Power Projects will be set up during five years that is from 2014-15 to 2018-19 and will require Central Government financial support of Rs.4050 crore.  Smaller parks in Himalayan and other hilly States where contiguous land may be difficult to acquire in view of the difficult terrain, will also be considered. The solar parks will be developed in collaboration with State Governments and their agencies. The choice of implementing agency for developing and maintaining the park is left to the State Government. The States, applying under the scheme, will have to designate an agency for the development of the solar park. The State Government will first nominate the implementing agency for the solar park and also identify the land for the proposed solar park. It will then send a proposal to the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) for approval along with (or later) the name of the implementing agency. The implementing agency may be sanctioned a grant of upto Rs.25 Lakh for preparing a Detailed Project Report (DPR) of the Solar Park, conducting surveys, etc. The DPR must be prepared in 60 days. Thereafter, application may be made by the implementing agency to SECI for the grant of up to Rs. 20 lakhs/MW or 30 percent of the project cost including Grid-connectivity cost, whichever is lower. The approved grant will be released by Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) as per milestones prescribed in the scheme. All the States and Union Territories are eligible for benefitting under the scheme.  Solar parks will enable development of solar power in remote areas where land is inexpensive. As the transmission system will be developed for the entire park, developers will not have to set up their own transmission lines. This will not only save money but will also avoid damaging the landscape of the area as only limited transmission lines would be laid. Developers would be able to set up projects very fast as they will not have to get statutory and other clearances.  India will emerge as a major solar power producing country as nowhere in the world are solar parks being developed on such a large scale. Background: The Finance Minister, while presenting Budget for the year 2014-15, had amongst other things announced that the new and renewable energy deserves a very high priority and proposed to take up Ultra Mega Solar Power Projects in Rajasthan, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, and Laddakh in Jammu & Kashmir for which he had set aside a sum of Rs. 500 crore in the Budget.  The scheme for development of Solar Parks and Ultra Mega Soiar Power Projects has been conceived on the lines of the "Charanka Solar Park" in Gujarat which is a first-of-its-kind large scale Solar Park in India with contiguous developed land and transmission connectivity.

Hope to touch USD 100 bn trade with ASEAN by 2015

Hope to touch USD 100 bn trade with ASEAN by 2015: Nirmala Sitharaman Need to establish regional value chains to sustain long-term economic relationship: Rajeev Kher

The Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Commerce & Industry Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman today said that “in 2009, the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) on goods had been signed (with ASEAN) and because of that and through that trade between ASEAN and India have been reaching about USD 80 billion level. We hope by 2015 it will touch USD 100 billion and get doubled by 2022. So there is lot of work, there is a lot of scope.” Delivering the keynote address at the 2nd India – CLMV Business Conclave, here today, the Minister said that India-CLMV (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam) trade was concentrated in only a few items and there was tremendous scope to deepen and widen the trade basket. The Minister mentioned that several sectors hold potential for trade and investment between India and the CLMV countries. These included skill development, agricultural products, manufacturing, project exports, energy among others. Smt. Sitharaman said that now “India’s Look East Policy has become very sharp focussed and it is “Act East” Policy.” She said that there is a need of “greater and accelerated engagement across the globe with East Asia.” The Minister stressed that “we are very keen to open up the north-east part of India; open up the economy, improve on its connectivity with the rest of the East and therefore look at India’s North-East as threshold to our Act East Policy.” The Minister said that “Commerce, Culture and Connectivity” are the three pillars of India’s engagement with the CLMV countries. The Minister said that “it is imperative that India deepens its trade and investment with the four countries. Currently, 70-80% of India-CLMV trade is centred around only a few products. I think there is a scope to expand the basket and bring in more commodities and manufactured goods into it.” She also pointed that “the Government of India has accorded high priority to economic engagements with the four countries, and is working towards establishing seamless physical connectivity with the region.” Robust physical connectivity through road, rail and sea links will enable businesses on both sides to leverage the opportunities created by the India-ASEAN FTA in Goods. The FTA in Services and Investment will come into force with effect from 1st July, 2015. Seamless connectivity will spur people-to-people contacts and tourism, create new enterprises and millions of jobs for people in the region, especially when the economic corridors along the India-CLMV road and rail lines would be completely fully developed,” said the Minister. In his address, Shri Rajeev Kher, Commerce Secretary stated that India’s trade with the CLMV region amounted to USD 13 billion in 2013-14. Much of that trade, he observed, was with Vietnam. He felt that there was tremendous scope to expand trade relations with the other countries in the region. Mr. Kher highlighted the need to establish regional and sub-regional value chains in order to maintain and sustain long-term economic relationship with the region. He stated that India industry could partner with businesses in the CLMV countries to reach out to newer markets. He felt that by joining forces, Indian and CLMV industry could take advantage of the trade agreement architecture that the CLMV countries have to access newer markets.

Pragati – Scholarship for Girls

To provide encouragement and support to Girl Child to pursue technical education “Pragati Scholarship” has been launched by the Government from the year 2014-15. The salient features of the “Pragati Scholarship” are as under: (i) Number of scholarship per annum: 4000 (ii) One Girl per family whose family income is less than Rs.6 Lakhs per annum (iii) The candidates will be selected on merit at the qualifying examination (iv) The candidates should have been admitted to 1st year of the Degree or diploma programme in any of the AICTE approved institute during the academic year 2014-15 through centralized admission process of the State /Central Government. (v) Amount of scholarship: Tuition Fee of Rs. 30000/- or at actual, whichever is less and Rs. 2000/- per month for 10 months as incidentals each year. At present, the Government does not propose to revise the eligibility criteria and other conditions of the “ Pragati Scholarship”.

National Mission ON Teachers and Teaching

The Government proposes to launch a new Scheme Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya National Mission on Teachers and Teaching. The programme envisions to focus holistically on whole sector of education without fragmenting it, based on levels and sectors and also to strengthen institutional mechanisms for strengthening vertical and lateral linkages. This would consolidate and strengthen on-going programmes related to teachers and teaching through effective coordination. It will also provide an integrated platform for building synergies among all the existing initiatives and will attempt to create a comprehensive vehicle for Teacher/Faculty related programmes and schemes. The programme envisages to augment capacity at individual level and also enhance institutional infrastructure to give impetus to training of teachers at pre service and in service level.