1st, September, 2022

 

Topic: Aam Aadmi Mohalla Clinics in Punjab

 

Importance: Punjab PCS Prelims and Mains

 

Punjab PCS Prelims: Key challenges and responses : Social sector – Health

Punjab PCS Mains:

• Paper 4: General Aptitude I: Topic: Issues relating to the development and management of Social Sector- Health

 

What is the news?

• Punjab Minister for Social Security Women and Child Welfare Dr. Baljit Kaur inaugurated health centers in Lakhewali and Nandgarh villages in Muktsar.

Minister shared:

• Punjab Government is offering health facilities to its residents in the form of Health, Centers which are not far away from their homes.
• The government will fulfill every promise made to the residents of the state.
• Minister said that apart from these centers in villages the government has already started providing better health facilities by setting up more than 100 Aam Aadmi Clinics across the state.

 

How does Aam Aadmi Mohalla Clinic clinic work?

• Aam Aadmi Mohalla Clinics (AAMC), also known as Mohalla Clinics, are primary health centres in the union territory of New Delhi in India. They offer a basic package of essential health services including medicines, diagnostics, and consultation free of cost. Mohalla in Hindi means neighborhood or community.

 

How it will help?

• Villages will help in the treatment of common diseases, pregnant women, vaccination for children, offer family planning to villagers and also birth and death registration will be done here along with other similar health services.

(Source: Punjab Government)

 

 

Topic: Steps to stop food adulterators in Punjab

 

Importance: Punjab PCS Prelims and Mains

 

Punjab PCS Prelims: Key challenges and responses : Social sector – Health

Punjab PCS Mains:

• Paper 4: General Aptitude I: Topic: Issues relating to the development and management of Social Sector- Health

 

What is the news?

• Punjab Government will not spare food adulterators at any cost: Health Minister

Minister shared:

• Any kind of food adulteration will not be tolerated and the culprits who do this will not be spared. He directed the health department officials that there should be no laxity in taking samples of raw and cooked food. Along with this, he also emphasized on paying special attention to adulteration in milk.

 

Steps towards this:

1) Punjab government will soon provide body-cams to the food officers of the state to bring transparency in the process of sample taking to reaching the lab.

2) Officials and employees of the food lab that the employees who delay the test report will be punished.

3) Employees to strictly follow the Punjab Food Act and asked that a summary report be sent to them every 15 days.

4) number of testing labs will be increased in the state in the near future and also emphasized on holding state level camps for the purpose of spreading health awareness among the people of the state.

5) Restaurants, dhabas, hotels etc. which prepare pure and quality food will be given letters of commendation. Along with this, the names of the shops, dhabas, restaurants, hotels etc. whose food samples will fail will be made public through the media.

(Source: Punjab Government)

 

 

Topic: Steps to empower women in Panchayati Raj Institutions in Punjab

 

 

Importance: Punjab PCS Prelims and Mains

 

Punjab PCS Prelims: Indian Polity : Panchayati Raj

Punjab PCS Mains:

• Paper 5: General Aptitude II: Topic: Indian Constitution & Polity

 

What is the news?

• A long overdue decision was taken to genuinely empower women instead of paying lip service.

What is the decision?

• Cabinet minister Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal issued instructions that will put an end to the practice of husbands/sons/relatives participating in meetings of Panchayati Raj Institutions on behalf of elected women.
• Some male members even sign documents on their behalf.

 

Minister shared:

• Rural Development Minister clearly stated that instructions have been issued several times in the past not to allow any woman elected representative’s husband/son or any other family member to participate on their behalf in the meetings of Panchayati Raj institutions, but despite of this it has been observed that whenever there is a meeting of the elected Zilla Parishads, Panchayat Committees and Gram Panchayats, instead of the elected women office bearers, their husbands or other family members attend the meetings. But it is mandatory for the elected representatives to participate in the meeting themselves, not anyone else on their behalf.

 

Directions to officers:

• Concerned officers have now been issued directions to strictly stop this wrong practice with immediate effect. It should also be ensured that whenever a meeting is held by the Panchayats or by the department, the elected female office bearers actively participate in the meeting and no other family member is allowed to participate in the meeting.
• The Rural Development and Panchayat Minister said that if any such thing happens in the future where a woman office holder is replaced by her husband/son or any other family member in the meeting, then strict action will be taken against the concerned.

(Source: Punjab Government)

 

 

Topic: Steps towards E-Governance in Punjab

 

Importance: Punjab PCS Prelims and Mains

 

Punjab PCS Prelims: Indian Polity : Governance Reforms

Punjab PCS Mains:

• Paper 4: General Aptitude I: Topic: Governance Reforms, Welfare schemes by the Centre and the State of Punjab and their performance

 

What is the news?

• In line with the commitment of Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann to provide hassle free and transparent services to citizens , the Governance Reforms Department has approved 283 services for which certificates with digital signatures will be issued.
• Applicants will now be able to receive these certificates with signatures directly from Sewa Kendras on WhatsApp or email.
• Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer gave this information in a press statement issued after a meeting held to review the functioning of the department today. While digitizing the delivery of 283 services, a regular notification has also been issued by the department in this regard.

Services include:

• These services include Caste Certificate, Birth and Death Certificate, Residence Certificate, Old Age Pension, Marriage Services, Arms Renewal, General Caste Certificate, Non Encumbrance Certificate, Backward Area Certificate and other services which are most needed by people in their daily life.

 

How this will help?

• Earlier people had queue up at Sewa Kendras when they needed these certificates.
• Every time one had to go to the service center and get the certificate signed with the hologram.
• According to the instructions given by the Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann to end the hassle of the people, now after applying once for these 283 services certificate, the applicant will get the certificate with digital signatures sitting at home through WhatsApp or email and they can make copies of it according to their needs.
• Apart from this, 93 services can be applied online at home without the need to visit the service center.

 

Minister shared:

• Governance Reforms Minister reviewed the pending cases in the service centers and assessed them district wise and asked for their immediate disposal of pending files.
• He also asked Deputy Commissioners of all the districts to continuously monitor the Sewa Kendras functioning and get feedback from the people. Apart from this, publicity should be done to make people aware about the 293 services with digital signatures.

(Source: Punjab Government)

 

 

Topic: Steps to to strengthen cooperative sector in Punjab

 

Importance: Punjab PCS Prelims and Mains

 

Punjab PCS Prelims: Indian Polity

Punjab PCS Mains:

• Paper 6: General Aptitude III: Topic: Important aspects of governance.

 

What is the news?

• In a bid to strengthen cooperative sector in the state, the Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann directed the Milkfed to set up state of art procurement infrastructure in the villages for collecting and supplying best quality milk.

The Chief Minister, while chairing a review meeting of the Milkfed shared:

• Upgradation of the procurement infrastructure is the need of hour to ensure best quality of milk is collected from villages and then is supplied to consumers after processing.
• CM envisioned that Milkfed will usher brand Verka to new horizons, where sole mantra shall be inclusive growth of all. He emphasized that Milkfed must ensure that it covers all the potential villages falling in Punjab and procure the maximum quantity of raw milk from there.

 

CM shared:

• Sole aim of his government is to extend maximum support and best prices to the dairy farmers of Punjab by following the true essence of cooperation. He also asserted that farmer friendly schemes should be implemented so as to boost the dairying business amongst the youth so as to make them financially independent and self reliant.
• CM also batted for setting in place modern technological interventions so as to ensure that the entire system remains transparent and user friendly.
• Chief Minister also directed the Milkfed to further launch an aggressive marketing campaign to capture sizeable chunk of consumer market not only in the state but across the country and even abroad. He said that this leading state cooperative has a perceptible presence in the domestic market as Verka is a household name in the region.
• CM said that VERKA products like Ghee, Milk, Butter, Lassi, Kheer, Curd, Ice-Cream, Sweets and others have already created a niche for themselves in the nationwide market which could further be widened with concerted efforts.

 

Vision shared:

• Chief Minister also asked Milkfed to double its turnover from Rs.4869 Crores in FY 2021-2022 to Rs 10000 Crores by FY 2026-2027. He assured fulsome support and cooperation to Milkfed for this noble cause. Bhagwant Mann also asked Mikfed to strenuous efforts to register its presence in a big way in the potential markets of adjoining states like Delhi-NCR, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttrakhand, Jammu-Kashmir and Uttar Pradesh.

(Source: Punjab Government)

 

 

Topic: Four wheat varieties from the Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) have been identified

 

Importance: Punjab PCS Prelims and Mains

 

Punjab PCS Prelims: Indian Geography : Land resources and agriculture. Economy: Agriculture

Punjab PCS Mains:

• Paper 7: General Aptitude IV: Topic: Modern Trends in Life Sciences
• Progress of Agricultural Science and its impact– Introduction to Biotechnology and its applications; Veterinary and Animal Sciences- latest developments.

 

What is the news?

• Four wheat varieties from the Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) have been identified for release across the nation.
• The varieties were identified at a meeting of the Varietal Identification Committee (VIC) held under the chairmanship of Dr TR Sharma, Deputy Director General (Crop Sciences), Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), at the Rajmata Vijayaraje Scindia Krishi Vishwavidyalaya, Gwalior (Madhya Pradesh).

Where it was announced?

• The decisions of the VIC were announced on Wednesday during the plenary session of the 61st All India Wheat and Barley Research Workers’ Meet held from August 29 to 31.

 

What are these varieties?

1) PBW 826 wheat variety has been identified for release under irrigated timely sown conditions of the North West Plain Zone — comprising Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, and western Uttar Pradesh, parts of Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, Jammu and Himachal Pradesh. It ranked first for grain yield in the zone during all three years of testing. It possesses bold grains with higher hectolitre weight.

2) PBW 826 was also identified for release under irrigated timely sown conditions of North Eastern Plains Zone of India comprising eastern Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand, etc. on account of high grain yield. It is very rare that a wheat variety has been identified simultaneously for the two major wheat growing zones of India.

3) PBW 872 has been identified for release under irrigated, early sown and high-yield potential conditions of the North West Plain Zone.

4) PBW 833 variety has been identified for release under irrigated late-sown conditions of the North East Plain Zone on the account of high-grain yield, rust resistance and protein content.

(Source: Punjab Agricultural University (PAU)