Four lakh still stranded in J&K

September 10, 2014

kashmir

Srinagar, Sep 10: Srinagar/ New Delhi, Sep 10: About 4 lakh people are still stranded and desperate for help in flood-ravaged Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), where heavy rain has eased helping the massive multi-agency rescue and relief efforts.

The toll in the worst floods to hit the state in six decades was reported to be around 200.The armed forces and National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) have so far rescued 47,227 people from different regions of the state, including almost 24,000 from Srinagar, the worst-affected area. The Army has deployed 220 columns for rescue and relief operations, in which 135 columns have been deployed in Srinagar region and 85 columns in Jammu region. The BSNL has launched operations on a war-footing with the Army and Air Force to restore mobile services through satellite network, officials said.

A part of the communication network might be restored by Wednesday, said officials in the Army, which is now providing satellite-based communication links to the chief minister, chief secretary and the director-general of police.A total of 61 Air Force choppers and transport aircraft undertook 451 sorties non-stop overnight to carry men and relief material to submerged areas where about 1 lakh troops were engaged in the rescue operations, said Defence Spokesperson Col S D Goswami.

The Army rescued Nepal Ambassador Ranjit Rae and a group of 28 Pakistani citizens, including several golfers who came to Srinagar to participate in a Saarc golf tournament, in the last 24 hours.Though the Army headquarters and Defence Ministry was flooded by rescue requests from every quarter, officials maintained that they were not paying any additional attention to the VIPs and were working under a well-coordinated plan.

Lt Gen Subrata Saha of the GoC 15 Corps said: “The weather has cleared and the intensity of the helicopter operations has picked up. In Srinagar, the water level has receded by 1.5-3 feet at some places but we are noticing an increase in water level on the northern side.” The water level in Dal Lake was steadily rising. TV footage showed flood waters from the lake entering the ground around the Hazratbal shrine.A woman who is nine months pregnant was rescued from Al-Farooq colony after her sister contacted the Army through Facebook. The area was heavily flooded and two storeys of the building were under water when the Army team managed to reach the house.An additional concern for the Army is the breach in the border fence in several pockets along the Line of Control and the international border in Rajouri and Poonch.

Engineers with the 16 Corps are now repairing the breaches to ensure terrorists do not take advantage of the situation.While shortage of boats was a handicap initially, more than 200 boats have now been pressed into service and more are on way. In addition to the standard relief rations, maggie packets, ready-to-eat meals, biscuits and packed milk is being provided to the victims.“Since Monday, 7 tonnes of baby food was also sent from Udhampur,” said Maj Gen Shokin Chauhan, additional director general (public information) at the Army headquarters.

As the Leh-Srinagar road reopened, supplies were sent from Army stocks kept at Leh. The Manali-Leh road is being used to send additional supplies to Leh.The number of medical teams has gone up to 80 and a field hospital is likely to be transported to Srinagar on Wednesday.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
February 2,2020

Feb 2: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s second budget in seven months disappointed investors who were hoping for big-bang stimulus to revive growth in Asia’s third-largest economy.

The fiscal plan -- delivered by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday -- proposed tax cuts for individuals and wider deficit targets but failed to provide specific steps to fix a struggling financial sector, improve infrastructure and create jobs. Stocks slumped as a proposal to scrap the dividend distribution tax for companies failed to impress investors.

"Far from being a game changer, the budget provides little in terms of short-term growth stimulus,” said Priyanka Kishore, head of India and South East Asia economics at Oxford Economics Ltd. in Singapore. “While income tax cuts will provide some relief on the consumption front, the multiplier effect is low and the overall stance of the budget is not expansionary."

India has gone from being the world’s fastest-growing major economy three years ago, expanding at 8%, to posting its weakest performance in more than a decade this fiscal year, estimated at 5%.

While the government has taken a number of steps in recent months to spur growth, they’ve fallen short of spurring demand in the consumption-driven economy. Saturday’s budget just added to the glum sentiment.

Okay Budget

“It’s an okay budget but not firing on all cylinders that the market was hoping for,” said Andrew Holland, chief executive officer at Avendus Capital Alternate Strategies in Mumbai.

The government had limited scope for a large stimulus given a huge shortfall in revenues in the current year. The slippage induced Sitharaman to invoke a never-used provision in fiscal laws, allowing the government to exceed the budget gap by 0.5 percentage points. The result: the deficit for the year ending March was widened to 3.8% of gross domestic product from a planned 3.3%.

On Friday, India’s chief economic adviser Krishnamurthy Subramanian said reviving economic growth was an “urgent priority” and deficit goals could be relaxed to achieve that. The adviser’s Economic Survey estimated growth will rebound to 6%-6.5% in the year starting April.

The fiscal gap will narrow to 3.5% next year, as the government budgeted for gross market borrowing to rise marginally to 7.8 trillion rupees from 7.1 trillion rupees in the current year. A plan to earn 2.1 trillion rupees by selling state-owned assets in the year starting April will also help plug the deficit.

Total spending in the coming fiscal year will increase to 30.4 trillion rupees, representing a 13% increase from the current year’s budget, according to latest data.

Key highlights from the budget:

* Tax on annual income up to 1.25 million rupees pared, with riders

* Dividend distribution tax to be levied on investors, instead of companies

* Farm sector budget raised 28%, transport infrastructure gets 7% more

* Spending on education raised 5%

* Fertilizer subsidy cut 10%

Analysts said the muted spending plan to keep the deficit in check will lead to more downside risks to growth in the coming months.

“It is very doubtful that the increase in expenditure will push demand much,” Chakravarthy Rangarajan, former governor at the Reserve Bank of India told BloombergQuint, adding that achieving next year’s budget deficit goal of 3.5% of GDP was doubtful.

With the government sticking to a conservative fiscal path, the focus will now turn to central bank, which is set to review monetary policy on Feb. 6. Given inflation has surged to a five-year high of 7.35%, the RBI is unlikely to lower interest rates.

What Bloomberg’s Economists Say:

The burden of recovery now falls solely on the Reserve Bank of India. With inflation breaching RBI’s target at present, any rate cuts by the central bank are likely to be delayed and contingent upon inflation falling below the upper end of its 2%-6% target range.

-- Abhishek Gupta, India economist

Governor Shaktikanta Das may instead focus on unconventional policy tools such as the Federal Reserve-style Operation Twist -- buying long-end debt while selling short-tenor bonds -- to keep borrowing costs down.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
April 22,2020

New Delhi, Apr 22: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday said that The Epidemic Diseases (Amendment) Ordinance, 2020, manifests his government's commitment to protecting healthcare workers braving COVID-19 on the frontline.
"The Epidemic Diseases (Amendment) Ordinance, 2020, manifests our commitment to protect each and every healthcare worker, who is bravely battling COVID-19 on the frontline. It will ensure the safety of our professionals. There can be no compromise on their safety!," Prime Minister Modi tweeted.
The Central government on Wednesday brought an ordinance to end the violence against health workers, making it a cognizable, non-bailable offence with the imprisonment of up to seven years for those found guilty.

"We have brought an ordinance under which any attack on health workers will be a cognizable, non-bailable offence. In the case of grievous injuries, the accused can be sentenced from 6 months to 7 years. They can be penalised from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh," Union Minister Prakash Javadekar briefed media after the meeting of the Cabinet.

"Such crime will now be cognisable and non-bailable. An investigation will be done within 30 days. Accused can be sentenced from three months to five years, and penalised from Rs 50,000 up to Rs 2 lakh," said Javadekar.

Moreover, if the damage is done to vehicles or clinics of healthcare workers, then a compensation amounting to twice the market value of the damaged property will be taken from the accused, said Javadekar.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
April 6,2020

New Delhi, Apr 6: With an increase of 490 cases in the last 12 hours, the total number of COVID-19 positive cases in India climbed to 4067, said Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Monday.

As many as 109 deaths have been reported across the country due to the deadly disease.
There are 3666 active cases in the country while 292 people have been cured/discharged/migrated.

Maharashtra has reported the highest number of COVID-19 cases so far, standing at 690, followed by Tamil Nadu and Delhi with 571 and 503 cases respectively. 

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.