Bhubaneswar: The Odisha Cabinet today approved a proposal for a novel initiative ‘Ama Odisha Nabin Odisha’.
The initiative aims at taking up measures to augment rural infrastructure leading to accelerated growth as well as to promote, preserve and protect Jagannath culture and tradition of the State.
“The State Government have modified the guidelines of the earlier intervention “Ama Gaon Ama Bikash” by giving it a new dimension in the form of “Ama Odisha Nabin Odisha” under State Plan to make it effective from the Financial Year 2023-24 for taking up measures to augment rural infrastructure leading to accelerated growth as well as to Promote, Preserve and Protect Jagannath culture and tradition of the State,” said an official press release of the Panchayati Raj & Drinking Water Department.
The vision of the intervention is to transform Odisha to modern and aspirational Odisha retaining the essence, soul and spirit of Jagannath culture and spreading over to the world. Odisha is the Land that gave Jagannath Culture to the world and a culture that is based on universal love, service and equality.
The main objective of the scheme is to provide missing links to the existing small and essential projects and development of infrastructure.
Also achieving empowerment of women, youth, bridging critical gap in education, digital and sports facilities, such as improvement of infrastructure for primary education and also providing missing links to the existing development infrastructure, construction, modernization and expansion works, creating additional facilities for Mission Shakti Groups at Gram Panchayat (GP) level, bridging critical gaps at GP level to improve rural areas by way of providing urban facilities, development of sports facilities for the youth, providing banking facilities and improvement of digital access in terms of mobile connectivity, optical fibre connectivity, WiFi and internet connectivity.
There is budget provision of Rs 4000.00 crore under the scheme from the State Budget. The scheme will cover all Gram Panchayats in each block of the State with an entitlement of Rs 50.00 lakh. The project cost shall be between Rs 2.50 lakh to Rs 10.00 lakh. The projects under the scheme shall be suggested/ recommended by local people/community organizations/public representatives and other stakeholders.
The consolidated G.P. wise project list of the Block shall be submitted to PR & DW Department with the signatures of the Collector and President, Zilla Parishad of the district for due examination and approval of the Government.
The Panchayat Samiti shall execute the work departmentally following due procedure. The Collector shall be authorized to select any other agency/agencies for execution of work.
Transparency measures such as a web based MIS for monitoring of the Scheme and a dedicated app for sharing of photographs before, during and after for each project with GIS tagging shall be developed under the scheme, the official release stated.
The Odisha cabinet has also recommended the proposal for inclusion of Kui language in the 8th schedule of Constitution of India.
Further, the State government has decided to implement the Chief Minister’s Power Development Programme (CMPDP) to address low voltage issues in rural areas. With an outlay of Rs 1284.49 crore, the scheme will be executed by power distribution companies during the financial years 2023-24 and 2024-25.
