Current Affairs - Gujarat

• To make agriculture sustainable and profitable in the tribal areas, the government of Gujarat has launched Agricultural Diversification Scheme-2021.
• It will benefit Vanbandhu- farmers in tribal areas and more than 1.26 lakh farmers from 14 tribal districts of the state.
• Under this scheme tribal farmers will get fertilizer-seed assistance of Rs. 31 crores in which 45 kg of urea, 50 kg of NPK and 50 kg of ammonium sulphate will be provided.
• Seeds of crops like maize, Bitter Melon (karela), Calabash (dudhi), tomato, millet, etc. are provided under this scheme.

The government of Gujarat has announced the policy for electric vehicles for the next four years.

Highlights

• The state aims to witness 2 lakh electric vehicles on the roads in next 4 years.
• The policy also aims at making Gujarat, the manufacturing hub for e-vehicles.
• With the new policy, minimum 6 lakh tonnes of carbon emission will be reduced.
• The policy also aims to establish additional 250 charging stations which will take the total number of charging stations in the state to 528.
• Petrol pumps will also be given approval for establishing charging stations.
• The state government will provide subsidy up to Rs. 20 thousand for 2 wheelers, 50 thousand for 3 wheelers and up to 1.5 lakh for 4 wheelers which will be directly credited to bank accounts through DBT.

Gujarat Government has announced its new Solar Power Policy - 2021.

Finer Points

• Any person, developer or industry can set up a solar project in its premises or land without any limit.
• A limit of only 50 per cent of sanctioned load/contract demand for industry to set up the solar project has been removed in the new policy.
• This policy will bring down power cost to industry from Rs. 8 per unit to around Rs. 4.50.
• It will reduce the production cost, which will help the state manufacturers to be globally competitive.
• The power consumers will be able to set up solar projects on their rooftop or vacant place. They can also offer their space to third party for power generation and utilization.
• Security deposit given to power companies has been cut from Rs. 25 lakh per MW to Rs. 5 lakh per MW.

• Gujarat Government has announced Digital Seva Setu Programme for the rural areas.
• The Digital Seva Setu has been initiated under the Bharat Net Project- an initiative to connect the Village Panchayats through 100 MBPS optical fibre network.
• Under this programme, the citizens will be able to get benefit of about 20 types of pro-people services which will be provided at the village panchayat level by paying a nominal fee of Rs. 20.
• The citizens can get various documents like duplicate ration card, income certificate, senior citizen certificate, caste certificate at their doorstep under this programme.
• The government will also provide powers of affidavit to the TalatiMantri at the Village Panchayat level so that people in rural areas do not have to visit the notary offices in towns and cities.