GENERAL KNOWLEDGE 2011: IMPORTANT GOVT. PLANS & PROJECTS 2011-PART 1
A major financial inclusion initiated: “Swabhimaan”
A major financial inclusion initiative was formally launched as “Swabhimaan” on 10 February, 2011 which aims at providing branchless banking through the use of technology. Banks will provide basic services like deposits, withdrawal and remittances using the services of Business Correspondents (Banks Saathi). The initiative enables Government subsidies and social security benefits to be directly credited to the accounts of the beneficiaries, enabling them to draw the money from the Business correspondents in their village itself.
Poverty-alleviation and employment-generation Programs
With a view to achieving inclusive development, several poverty-alleviation and employment-generation programs are being implemented by the Government of India. Some of the important schemes are as follows:
This flagship programme of the Government of India touches the lives of the rural poor and promotes inclusive growth. The MGNREGS aims at enhancing livelihood security of households in rural areas of the country by providing at least one hundred days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. It also mandates 33 per cent participation for women. The primary objective of the Scheme is to augment wage employment. This is to be done while also focusing on strengthening natural resource management through works that address causes of chronic poverty like drought, deforestation, and soil erosion and thus encourage sustainable development. The MGNREG Act was notified in 200 districts in the first phase with effect from 2 February 2006 and then extended to an additional 130 districts in the financial year 2007-08. The Act has been notified throughout the country with effect from 1 April 2008. During 2009-10, 5.26 crore households were provided employment under this scheme as against more than 4.51crore during 2008-09. During 2010-11, the budget estimate for the MGNREGS is ` 40,100 crore out of which ` 29,822.59 crore have been released to the States/ UTs till February 10, 2010.
The SGSY is a major ongoing scheme launched in April 1999 to help poor rural families (Swarozgaris) cross the poverty line by assisting them to take up income- generating economic activities through a mix of bank credit and government subsidy. The scheme involves selection of key activities, planning of activity clusters, organization of the poor into self-help groups (SHGs), and building of their capacities through training and skill development, creation of infrastructure, and technological and marketing support. The SGSY specially focuses on vulnerable sections among the rural poor with SCs/STs to account for at least 50 per cent and women 40 per cent of the swarozgaris. The share of minorities and disabled persons will be 15 per cent and 3 per cent respectively. Also, 15 per cent of the SGSY allocation is set apart for special projects that are implemented with different models of self-employment generation and to enhance the income-generating capacity of the rural poor. Since its inception, up to December 2010, 40.04 lakh SHGs have been formed under the SGSY, with women SHGs accounting for about 68 per cent of the total. A new initiative has also been taken up for setting up a Rural Self Employment Training Institute(RSETI) in each district of the country for basic and skill development training of rural BPL youth to enable them to undertake micro-enterprises and wage employment.
The SJSRY launched by the Government of India in December 1997 has been revamped with effect from April 2009. The scheme provides gainful employment to the urban unemployed and underemployed through encouraging the setting up of self-employment ventures or provision of wage employment, The revamped scheme has the following five components: (i) Urban Self Employment Programme (USEP) (II) Urban Women Self-help Programme (UWSP) (iii) Skill Training for Employment Promotion amongst Urban Poor (STEPUP) (iv) Urban Wage Employment Programme (UWEP), and (v) Urban Community Development Network (UCDN).
This programme, launched in 2005-06 for building infrastructure and basic amenities in rural areas, has six components, namely rural housing, irrigation potential, drinking water, rural roads, electrification, and rural telephony. It is an important initiative for reducing the gap between rural and urban areas and improving the quality of life of people in rural areas.
Rural Roads have been identified as one of the six components of Bharat Nirman and a goal has been set to provide connectivity to all villages with a population of 1000 (500 in hilly or tribal areas) with all-weather roads. New connectivity is proposed to be provided to a total of 54,648 habitations under Bharat Nirman. This will involve construction of 1,46,184 km of rural roads. In addition to new connectivity, Bharat Nirman envisages upgradation /renewal of 1,94,130 km of existing rural roads. Under the rural roads component of Bharat Nirman, 38,575 habitations have been provided all-weather road connectivity up to December 2010
Rural Sanitation: Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC)
The TSC is one of the flagship programmes of the Government of India. The TSC follows a community-led and people-centered approach. It places emphasis on information, education, and communication (IEC) for demand generation for sanitation facilities. It also places emphasis on school sanitation and hygiene education (SSHE) for changing the behaviour of people from a young age. The components of the TSC include start-up activities, IEC, individual household latrines (IHHL), community sanitary complexes (CSC), SSHE, Anganwadi toilets, alternate delivery mechanism, in the form of rural sanitary marts (RSMs) and production centres (PCs), and administrative charges.
The JNNURM, a seven year programme launched in December 2005, provides financial assistance to cities for infrastructure, housing development, and capacity development. Two of its four components-Basic Services to the Urban Poor (BSUP) for 65 select cities and Integrated Housing and Slum Development Programme (IHSDP) for other cities and towns--are devoted to shelter and basic service needs of the poor. The JNNURM also emphasizes the implementation of the following three mandatory pro-poor key reforms to enhance the capacity of urban local bodies (ULBs) - (i) internal earmarking within local body budgets for basic services to the urban poor;(ii) earmarking at least 20-25 per cent of developed land in all housing projects (both public and private agencies) for the economically weaker section (EWS)/lower income group (LIG) category; (iii) implementation of seven-point charter for provision of seven basic entitlements/services. As the first national flagship programme for urbanization, the JNNURM has significantly triggered the creation of many innovative ideas in States that will increase their ability to maintain the momentum of the urban transformation they have initiated.
The Government has announced the vision of a 'slum-free India' through a new scheme, the Rajiv Awas Yojana. Subsequent to this announcement, extensive consultations have been held with various Ministries, experts, state Governments, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), financial and urban experts, and private industry to frame the guidelines. These draft guidelines have been critically appraised by an expert committee. The preparatory phase of RAY, called the Slum Free City Planning Scheme has been implemented. Under this scheme an amount of ` 60 crore has been released to States for undertaking slum surveys, mapping of slums, developing slum information systems, undertaking community mobilization, preparation of slum-free city/ State plans, etc. before seeking support under RAY.
Skill Development
As mentioned in the Economic Survey 2009-10, a three-tier structure for coordinated action on skill development has been set up. The three-tier structure consists of (i) the Prime Minister's National Council on Skill Development, (ii) the National Skill Development Coordination Board (NSDCB), and (iii) the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC). The Prime Minister's National Council has outlined the core operating principles which, inter alia, advocate the need for co-created solutions for skill development based on partnerships between States, civil society, and community leaders. The emphasis is on making skills bankable for all sections of society including the poorest of the poor. The issue of optimum utilization of existing infrastructure available in the States and using the same for skill training is also emphasized. By the end December 2010, 28 States and five Union Territories had set up Skill Development Missions. As a next step, all these States/UTs need to assess the skill gaps in the major 308 Economic Survey 2010-11 Website: http://indiabudget.nic.in sectors and formulate action plans for bridging them. The NSDC, set up on 31July 2008 as a non-profit public-private partnership (PPP) in skill development for co-coordinating/ stimulating private-sector initiatives, has been mandated to achieve the target of creation of skilled workforce of 150 million persons by 2022 under the National Skill Development Policy. As a first step towards achieving the target, a comprehensive skill gap study for 21 high-growth sectors has been completed in order to build a baseline for formulation of a comprehensive strategy. This has generated a lot of interest in private sector in investing in skill development. The corporation has developed a strong governance structure for the disbursal of funds.
