Home » Current Affairs PCS » Punjab Current Affairs

Punjab Current Affairs

30^st August 2019

Context:-

The ‘Paani Bachao, Paise Kamao’ campaign, launched by the state government to check depletion of underground water by offering financial benefits to the farmers for every unit of power they save, has started yielding good results.
As many as 277 farmers have applied for the scheme with the Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL).

A total subsidy of Rs 15.74 lakh for saving 3,93,645 units has been disbursed among the enrolled consumers of six pilot feeders so far, as per reports of the Energy and Resources Institute (TERI).
Launched in June 2018, the scheme is a direct benefit transfer for electricity (DBTE) to agriculture pump set consumers and had six feeders in Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur and Fatehgarh Sahib districts in the first phase of its implementation, covering a total of 940 consumers in over 30 villages.

World Bank and Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) were supported in implementing the scheme on new feeders along with The Energy and Resource Institute (TERI), IT Power India (ITPI) and Punjab Agricultural University (PAU).

Under the scheme, agricultural consumers are given a fixed electricity allocation (kWh/hp) for a two-month billing cycle for paddy and non-paddy seasons.
For electricity consumption measured from individual meters that is lower than the fixed allocation, the farmer will get Rs 4 per kWh. Excess consumption above the fixed allocation, however, attracts no charge.

Most of the farmers have taken land on lease. Even if they save electricity and water, the subsidy goes to the landowner, not to the farmer.
The meters installed in the fields of a majority of the farmers are still in the name of the deceased family member — grandfather or father. Thus, they do not qualify for enrollment under the scheme.

(Source:- The Tribune)

The world observes Sampurna Diwas, the propitious day on which composing of Guru Granth Sahib was finished. Guru Granth Sahib or Adi Sri Granth Sahib Ji.