National

Budget 2022: National Highways Expansion By 25 Km, Says Nirmala Sitharaman

New Delhi: Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman tabled the Budget for 2022-23 in Parliament today. The minister announced the country’s national highway will be expanded by 25,000 km under PM Modi’s Gati Shakti Yojna for multi-modal connectivity.

This concludes that 70kms roads will be built daily, that almost doubles the rate of 40 km that was set for 2022. An allotment of ₹20,000 crore has been proposed for the project.

The Economic Survey 2021-22 released on Monday said that in 2021-22 (till September), 20.89 km of highways were constructed daily, which was almost half of the annual target of 40 km a day set for the year. This was also slightly more than 36.5 km per day in 2020-21 when a countrywide lockdown was imposed to check the Covid-19 spread.

Sitharaman also announced that 100 new cargo terminals will be developed in the next three years. This too will come under the Gati Shakti plan. Launched in October last year, the plan is aimed at coordinated planning and execution of infrastructure projects and bringing down logistics costs. The idea is to create a synergy between infrastructure and logistics, both of people and goods, and the location of projects.

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2 Lakh Anganwadi To Be Upgraded: FM Sitharaman

Ashmita Chhabria

New Delhi: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announcing the Budget on February 1, said that 2 lakh anganwadis will be upgraded. While presenting the Budget in the Parliament she highlighted the government’s push on women and children empowerment, via boosters which will improve their intellectual, social and economic growth. 

The Ministry of Women and Child Development will be supporting over 2,00,000 anganwadis, which will be upgraded to Saksham Anganwadis under the umbrella scheme of Saksham Anganwadi and POSHAN 2.0. The scheme includes Umbrella ICDS — Anganwadi Services, Poshan Abhiyaan, Scheme for Adolescent Girls and National Creche Scheme. 

The Finance Minister said, “Our government has comprehensively revamped schemes of the Ministry of Women and Child Development such as Mission Shakti, Mission Vatsalya, Saksham Anganwadi and Poshan 2.0 to provide benefits.”

Adding on she said, “Recognising the importance of ‘Nari Shakti’, 3 schemes were launched to provide integrated development for women and children. 2 lakh Anganwadis will be upgraded for improving child health.”

She further states that the Saksham Anganwadis were new generation Anganwadis. They had better infrastructure and audio visual aids. In her budget speech, Nirmala said, “Saksham Anganwadis are new generation anganwadis that have better infrastructure and audio-visual aids powered by clean energy and providing an improved environment for early childhood development.”

These anganwadis would be upgraded using clean energy for early child development. For government health of children was of paramount importance and upgraded anganwadis will be of key importance in the direction.

According to reports, in the last financial year, Rs 20,105 crores were expected to be invested in the scheme. The scheme will be introducing upgraded facilities like smart teaching, smart learning, crèche facilities etc.

Last year, the Union Budget allotted resources towards Aatmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan extensively, be it in the social sector, energy, government reforms, migrant workers or agriculture. While the National Education Policy was the focus, the education sector saw a budgetary slash of 6 per cent from Rs 99 crores to Rs 93.2 crores last year.

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