Rajouri: As part of the Central Government’s Public Outreach Programme, Union Minister of State for Industries and Commerce Smt. Anupriya Singh Patel today concluded her two-day visit to district Rajouri.
On the second day of her tour, the Union MoS visited Panchayat Saranoo of Block Dhangri and interacted with the women PRI and general public. The PRIs and the locals raised several issues and demands about different sectors.
In her address, the MoS said that J&K is heading towards a new era of development and prosperity and witnessing a wave of positive change with the Government taking several reformative measures for socio-economic development, besides empowering the people of the UT.
The Minister said that the Union Government is committed to ensuring transparency and accountability in its functioning which are necessary for democratic and participative governance, as they help build trust and improve the impact of schemes.
Describing the objective of her visit, she informed that the special public outreach by the Central Government to JK UT has been launched to take first-hand account of the public grievances at their doorsteps and ensure better implementation of the Government schemes on the ground.
“All efforts are being made to bring JK into mainstream development and several schemes have been launched in this regard”, she said.
Terming the 3-tier system a boon for democracy, Smt. Patel said that the system is playing a crucial role in strengthening democracy at the grassroots level as the people themselves are now formulating the plans as per the needs of their areas.
While enumerating the steps being taken to encourage investment and promote industrial development in the UT, she informed that in a major decision, the Government of India has approved a new Industrial Developmental Scheme for Jammu and Kashmir.
“To tap the export potential of agricultural and industrial products, the Government is engaging with states and union territories to implement the Districts as Export Hub (DEH) initiative in all districts of the country”, she informed.
She further informed that under the DEH initiative, District Export Promotion Committees (DEPCs) have been constituted in most of the districts and products/services with export potential have been identified in each district.
“The scheme will go a long way in ushering an era of socio-economic development of the region and for catering to the aspirations of people and it will also provide impetus to Micro, Small, Medium and larger enterprises”, she informed.
She informed that an Industrial land bank has been established for Industrial Growth and 6000 acres of land has been acquired.
“Under this new Industrial policy, 4.50 lakh unemployed youth would be provided employment”, the Minister informed.
While stressing on export promotion, the MoS said that it will play a considerable role in employment generation and asked the concerned to make a suitable district export plan to make the district an export hub of indigenous products.
—PIB

KR Desk