E-Paper
Punjab Rural Development (Amendment) Bill gets cabinet nod
With the enactment of the Punjab Rural Development (Amendment) Bill, the rural development fund will be spent for the construction or repair of approach roads to mandis/procurement centres
To further strengthen the rural infrastructure, the Punjab cabinet led by chief minister Bhagwant Mann on Tuesday gave a nod to the introduction of the Punjab Rural Development (Amendment) Bill-2022 by amending Section-7 of the Punjab Rural Development Act-1987 in the upcoming session. With the enactment of the new bill, the rural development fund will be spent for the construction or repair of approach roads to mandis/procurement centres and streetlights, the development of new mandis/procurement centres and the development of old/katcha mandis/procurement centres, making arrangements for the supply of drinking water and improving sanitation, etc, said a spokesperson of the chief minister’s office.
Likewise, the RDF would also be spent for augmenting storage facilities in mandis to store procured stocks to strengthen the procurement and marketing systems, provide relief to debt-stressed farmers of the state to eliminate distress sales, development of hardware/software related to procurement/linking of land records, crop survey and automation and mechanisation of mandis with the facility of cleaning, sorting, drying, analysing the quality of grains, small shipping silo, bag sacking and stitching. Also, it gave the go-ahead for amending clause 3(1) of The Punjab State Legislature Members (Pension and Medical Facilities Regulation) Act, 1977, to give MLAs of the Punjab Vidhan Sabha one pension (irrespective of the number of terms served) at the new rate of ₹60,000 per month plus dearness allowance as applicable to the pensioners of the state government. The state government had initially brought an ordinance for “one MLA, one pension”, but the governor returned it, asking the government to bring a bill.
Gap funding approved moong procurement
The state cabinet also approved viability gap funding to the tune of ₹66.56 crore for nodal agency Markfed at the rate of ₹1,875 per quintal for the procurement of summer moong at a minimum support Price (MSP) of ₹7,275 per quintal. During the current season, moong is being sown on about 95,000 acres with an expected yield of five quintal per acre. The government has already given a green signal for providing MSP to save the natural resources of the state and improve soil health.
