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11/14/07
Sarvajan Hitay Sarvajan Sukhay-For The Gain of The Many and For The Welfare of The Many-Division level review meeting of four divisions held at Meerut-Mayawati promises UPCA new ground -Riding the train of dreams across India-Manufacturing still limited to select states: Ficci-Maya plans advisory council with SC Mishra at its helm-Be wary of the enemy within: Rahul -Pawar defends fresh wheat import tender - UP shows success in anti-polio drive-Satish Misra steps down as Uttar Pradesh minister
Filed under: General
Posted by: site admin @ 10:12 am
 
 

Sarvajan Hitay Sarvajan Sukhay-For The Gain of The Many and For The Welfare of The Many

 

Division level review meeting of four divisions held at Meerut

 

Lucknow : November 12, 2007 The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Km.Mayawati reviewed the progress of various development programmes and law and order here today. The Cabinet Secretary Mr. Shashank Shekhar Singh, Chief Secretary Mr. Prashant Kumar Mishra, Principal Secretary to C.M Mr. V.K. Sharma and Kunwar Fateh Bahadur, Principal Secretary Home Mr. J.N. Chamber and DGP Mr. Vikram Singh were present on the occasion. After the meeting, she directed the officers to acquaint the division and district level officers about her directives so that the development works could be speeded up and the hurdles coming in their way could be removed. She took stock of the situation of the discrepancies surfacing in the spot verification of the development works conducted at the division and district level. She further directed the Cabinet Secretary Mr. Singh to preside over the review meeting at Meerut today along with the team of the senior officers. The Chief Minister directed the Cabinet Secretary that the division and district level officers should be told about her directives and they should themselves conduct the physical verification of the various development works. Besides, they should also take the suggestions of the officers. She said that explicit orders had been issued at the time of the formation of the Government for speeding up the pace of development works and also to strictly follow the directives issued regarding the law and order in the State, but some laxity was observed and therefore strict action was being initiated against careless officers by fixing their responsibility. The Chief Minister extensively reviewed the functioning and works of various programmes, schemes and departments such as, Dr. Ambedkar Gramin Samagra Vikas Yojna, Manyawar Shri Kanshiram Ji Shahri Samagra Vikas Yojna, construction of roads funded by State finance, Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojna, creation of employment, Rashtriya Gramin Rozgar Guarantee Yojna, Sampoorana Gramin Rozgar Yojna, Rural Drinking Water Supply, replacement of defunct transformers, checking power pilferage, ensuring presence of doctors, construction of primary schools and junior high schools, ensuring presence of teachers, mid-day-meal, distribution of scholarship and pension, verification of BPL card holders, PDS, rural housing, running of Government tube-wells, availability of water till the tail-end of canals, restoring possession to original lease-holder by removing illegal encroachers, allotment of agriculture and housing land, organising tehsil diwas and recovery of tax and non-tax revenue. Taking a look at the law and order, Km. Mayawati also reviewed the progress of the action taken on the F.I.Rs registered under the special drive during 22 June to 22 August, 2007, situation of the heinous crimes occurred after 13 May 2007 and action taken under the cases like murder, dacoity, ransom, kidnapping, transformer and wire theft, action taken in the cases registered under the SC/ST harassment, women harassment, eve-teasing, rape etc., progress of the pending investigations, action taken against the wanted criminals, action taken against criminals carrying reward on their heads, identification of white collar criminals, land mafias, mining, contract, transport and other mafias, criminals indulging into illegal liquor trade, preventive action, action taken in the cases against illegal encroachers of leased lands, disposal of various complaints of people by officers, details of the various F.I.Rs. registered at the SSP and SP offices after 17 August 2007, action taken regarding the arms licences, cancellation of the arms licences issued to the persons with criminal background and representation of various categories in the posts of the Station-in-charge. The Chief Minister directed for immediate suspension and for taking departmental action against Superintending Engineers of Electricity Department Mr. P.K. Sharma and Mr. Rishi Pal Singh of Bulandshahr and Bagpat respectively, besides the Executive Engineers E.D.D. Mr. S.K. Jain of Electricity Department- Bagpat , Mr. Subhash Chandra-Mawana, Mr.S.K.Agarwal-Khurja, and Mr. Kamlesh Kumar-J.P. Nagar for their careless approach towards the development programmes running in Saharanpur, Moradabad, Bareilly and Meerut divisions, presenting false data, non-completion of development works according to the standard within stipulated period, ineffective checking of power theft, failure for replacement of non-functional transformers and irresponsibility towards duty. Km. Mayawati also directed for giving censure entries to CDO Budayun Mr. Hari Kant Tripathi and CDO Gautambuddha Nagar Mr. P.K. Pandey for poor quality works and their failure in completion of development works within time running under Rural Development Department. She also directed for the suspension of District Development Officer of Moradabad Mr. R.D. Sharma besides giving censure entries to project directors DRDA Bareilly Mr. Ram Naresh, Moradabad Mr. Pramod Kumar Srivastava, Bijnour Mr. Suresh Chandra (II). The Chief Minister directed for suspension and departmental action against Executive Engineer Jal Nigam J.P. Nagar Mr. J.K. Karnwal, Asst. Engineer Jal Nigam Gautambuddha Nagar Mr. S.K. Jain and Junior Engineer Jal Nigam J.P. Nagar Mr. Atul Rastogi for careless approach towards solving drinking water problems and implementation of drinking water schemes within stipulated period. She also directed for suspension and departmental action against Executive Engineer Tubewell Zone I, Bareilly Mr. Chandrabali Maurya who was found guilty for poor maintenance and repairing of tube-wells besides its non-functioning. The Chief Minister directed the suspension of Executive Engineer P.W.D. National Highway Moradabad Mr. K.P. Singh, Superintending Engineer Bareilly Mr. B.B. Sharma, Executive Engineer Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojna Bijnour Mr. Ramesh Chandra and Executive Engineer Shahjahanpur Mr. P.C. Srivastava for their failure in construction and repairing of roads, besides not starting the works of sanctioned roads on time. Km. Mayawati directed for suspension of CO Sardhana Meerut Mr. P.K. Tiwari and adverse entry to CO Parikshitgarh Mr. K.K. Bhalla for failure in maintaining the law and order situation according to the directives of government, failure in taking action in registered cases within time besides curbing crimes. The Cabinet Secretary Mr. Shashank Shekhar Singh made aware regarding the directives of the Chief Minister in the review meeting of Meerut division after the review at State level and received the officers’ suggestion. He also made on the spot visit and reviewed the progress of several development works and schemes. The Chief Secretary Mr. Prashant Kumar Mishra, Principal Secretary Home Mr. J.N. Chamber, DGP Mr. Vikram Singh and other government senior officers were present on the occasion, besides the officers of concerning divisions and districts. ********

NDTV.com
 
Mayawati promises UPCA new ground
 
Sambuddha Dutt
Tuesday, November 13, 2007 8:36 AM (Kanpur)
 
The Uttar Pradesh Cricket Association or the UPCA can boast of several players who have made it at the international level in recent times, RP Singh, Piyush Chawla, Praveen Kumar and Suresh Raina among them.
 

However, the UPCA still does not own a cricket ground of its own but they seem to have struck a right chord with Chief Minister Mayawati who has now promised them land for a brand new facility.

 

The UP Chief Minister was the guest of honour at the man of the match ceremony after the Kanpur ODI between India and Pakistan. Apparently, the state government machinery got into full swing after the invite was sent to CM Mayawati to make sure that the Green Park stadium was spruced up.

“We had a lot of co-operation from the administration, a lot of co-operation and support from Mayawati. Two of her principal secretaries came to the ground seven times to view each and every thing,” said Premdhar Pathak, Secretary, UP Cricket Association.

 

In the past, the stadium has been in the news for many wrong reasons, a slow pitch, dilapidated facilities and general neglect. The UPCA has always said that their hands were tied because they did not own the stadium.

 

In fact, the condition of the ground has cost the UPCA several international fixtures. But now that the Chief Minister is on their side, UPCA seems all set to get a new stadium in Lucknow.

 

“She’ll be giving us land to make an international ground. It will be UPCA’s ownership, because only then will the BCCI give us Rs 30 crore. Now their conditions will start coming in. in fact, they had asked us how they are going to benefit from the free land that they give us,” said Pathak.

 

“BCCI Vice-President Rajeev Shukla has said that they will make an enclosure of 5,000 for the CM and her officials.”

A separate enclosure for the Chief Minister and other officials will of course mean lesser seats for the fans. In fact on Sunday, 60,000 people turned up at the Green Park even though the capacity is just 40,000.

 

It’s quite surprising that an area as large as the former Uttar Pradesh has just one cricket association. The challenges ahead are many, like getting their own stadium and promoting the game at all levels so that more Kaifs’, Rainas’ and RP Singhs’ can be produced

 

 
 

A food vendor positions himself to switch trains at a stop aboard the Pushpak Express. (Christie Johnston for the IHT)

Riding the train of dreams across India

Published: November 13, 2007
 
 

ABOARD THE PUSHPAK EXPRESS, India: The man with neatly parted hair stood in the doorway of the hurtling train. And then, at the perfect moment, he jumped.

This was not about suicide, however. It was about tea. Having popped out of the door, the man clung to the knobs and rods of the train’s exterior with one hand. His other hand gripped the vat of scalding tea tied to his belt.

 

He glided like a rock climber across the train’s epidermis, from one foothold to the next. He reached the steel beam that connects the cars and crossed it like a tightrope. Then, having arrived at the next car, he hopped among more footholds and, at last, ducked inside to utter his sales pitch:

“Tea! Tea! Get your hot tea!”

 

Such acrobatics are not required of vendors on most of the world’s trains - nor even in this train’s cars in first class or second class. Those are ordinarily connected from the inside. But this was third class on the Pushpak Express, a $6, 24-hour ride ferrying migrants from India’s bleak heartland to the thriving coastal megalopolis of Mumbai. And in an echo of the ancient caste system, officialdom had judged it necessary to seal off these passengers from the compartments of the luckier-born.

Multimedia

Video: Aboard the Pushpak Express
» View
Kindly visit:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/13/asia/migrants.php
 

These passengers are changing the world. In one the greatest migrations in history, an average of 31 villagers are predicted to show up in an Indian city every minute for the next 43 years, according to a study by Goldman Sachs - 700 million people in all. This exodus, along with China’s, has helped push the world over a historic threshold this year: the planet, for the first time, is more urban than rural.

 

Behind this shift are a handful of obscure routes that play a pivotal role: the buses from Hunan and Jiangxi provinces in south-central China to wealthy Guangzhou, for example, and the trains that link the desolate Indian states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh with India’s capital, New Delhi, and its financial center, Mumbai.

 

To ride the Pushpak Express from Lucknow, in Uttar Pradesh, to Mumbai is to witness this global metamorphosis writ small.

In Lucknow, the migrants had been waiting in silence on the platform - that is, until they heard the train roll in, clickety-clack. They surged to their feet and, with the train still decelerating, made for the doors.

 

Mob rule erupted. Strangers pushed and pulled one another. An infant, clinging to her father’s back, was not spared flying elbows as travelers vied to fling themselves through the large metal doors.

 

Tranquillity was ultimately restored, and before long the train was lumbering toward Mumbai.

 

As evening surrendered to night, the passengers settled into position. Most were migrants, and most were men. Some sat upright on the wooden benches; others lay on the floor; a few climbed into the luggage rack near the ceiling to secure scarce personal space.

 

Wide-eyed new migrants mingled with hardened veterans. There were a handful of what the veterans call “new men” - first-timers to Mumbai. They were rarely older than 18, dispatched by families whose farms are struggling and who need a son in the big city to survive.

 

Sonu Gupta is 15. He looks more like 10, with his wiry body and close-cropped hair. He was traveling with a family friend from his village, which is a half-day drive from Lucknow. Should the friend find him work in Mumbai, Gupta will become his family’s main breadwinner. “I’m happy,” he said in a shy voice, “and I’m scared.”

 

A few berths down, 18-year-old Deepak Kumar, with light, watery eyes and dirt-stained fingernails, would not admit to being scared. But he had every reason to be, for he was a runaway with no hands to hold. His mother had died. When his father remarried, his stepmother came to see Kumar as a useless holdover. She beat him, he said: “She says to me, ‘You’re not my child.’ “

 

One day, while visiting an uncle in Lucknow, he got a phone call from friends who had moved to Mumbai. Realizing Kumar was unhappy, they urged him to come to the city. He declined. Then he called back three days later, on a Tuesday, to say he would be there by Friday night.

 

And so he boarded the train with the clothes he was wearing, an empty wallet and a cellphone SIM card. Like so many migrants to the City of Gold, as Mumbai is often called, he came with little but his own lofty hopes.

 

The old-timers know better than to bathe in hope. Alok Misra, seated across from Kumar, was going to Mumbai for the third time in six years. He recalled his own early Mumbai fever.

“You see in the movies ‘Bombay, Bombay, Bombay,’ ” he said, striking a macho Bollywood pose every time he said the city’s name, which has officially been changed to Mumbai. “So people think, ‘I want to go to Bombay.’ “

 

He came with dreams of being a Bollywood star. Instead, he found work as a parking valet.

 

“Dreams don’t go away in Mumbai,” he said. “They just get smaller.”

 

As the train sputtered through the countryside, one could detect the shifting geography of affluence. It was now clearer why so many desert the heartland for the coast. The terrain became greener. Commodities like corn yielded to cash crops like grapes. The average farm plot swelled in size. Thatched-roof shacks ceded to mansions.

 

The Pushpak is a peculiar train, swallowing heroes from the village and spitting them out as nobodies in the big city.

These migrants will become Mumbai’s anonymous, floating underclass: taxi drivers who sleep in their taxis, electricians who wait for days for a $2 job. The irony is that, in leaving the village, they are doing something heroic for their families - but the life they go on to lead feels anything but. Most inure themselves to the prospect of endless sacrifice: they toil so that others might eat. “I don’t live for myself,” said Nowshad Ali, who has come 15 times to Mumbai since 1986 to work in a bakery.

 

Kumar, the runaway, was staring and listening to the veterans’ tales. At times, his eyes welled with tears. But he was not alone. Misra and his friends began to make him laugh. One boy reached out and took Kumar’s hand into his own. Another told funny stories about their own foibles in Mumbai, as if to say: “We’ve gone through this. You will survive.” [In fact, Kumar had a discouraging start in Mumbai. His contact failed to meet him at the station. This reporter gave him $12 for a room and wished him luck.]

 

This is the paradox of the Pushpak Express. Here was a train carrying passengers from the collectivist safety of the village and dumping them in the ruthless, anonymous city. But on board, for a final few hours, collectivism had its last hurrah. To ride this train was to recall that India remains in so many ways a village nation: the effortless involvement of people in other people’s lives, the ceaseless generosity.

 

The migrants showed a strange kindness to those just a few shades poorer than they. Throughout the journey, a parade of beggars marched through third class. There was little money to be had here, but it was also easiest to beg, because there were no conductors, as there were in the other compartments, to protect these travelers.

 

But when a beggar begs from the equally desperate, it requires special creativity. Two hours beyond Lucknow, a blind man’s voice began to waft through the car.

 

“Oh, my brothers, if you have no eyes, you have nothing,” he moaned, putting his hand out. Nearly every migrant gave him a coin, something most upper-class Mumbai residents would hesitate to do.

 

Later, a shirtless man slunk like a snake into the compartment, moving prostrate across the floor. He was ridding the floor of garbage. Then he got up, and he, too, begged.

 

Later still, as the Pushpak left its penultimate station before reaching downtown Mumbai, three transsexuals boarded the train, wearing colorful saris. They pressed the migrants with special force, taunting them when they did not pay.

 

One man demurred: He had already given money to the transsexuals. They corrected him. He had given to some other transsexuals, somewhere back in the countryside. They were Bombay transsexuals, and that was a different thing altogether.

Wednesday,Nov 14,2007
Manufacturing still limited to select states: Ficci
BS Reporter / New Delhi November 13, 2007

Only a handful of states are contributing to the growth of the Indian manufacturing sector, a study released by Ficci said today.

According to the study, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh accounted for 53.5% of the manufacturing sector growth in 2004-05. While Maharashtra’s contribution was the highest with 25%,  Gujarat stood second with 15% followed by Tamil Nadu with 7.4% and Uttar Pradesh with 6.1%.

 

The study also found out that the top 10 states accounted for over 82% of
the manufacturing sector GDP in 2004-05, which was the same as the numbers recorded in 1997-98. “These facts point out that the manufacturing sector growth has primarily remained concentrated in a few top states and has not diversified state-wise over a period of time,” the study said.

 

The study also observed that manufacturing activity was picking up in states like Orissa, Himachal Pradesh and Goa.

 

According to the study, the share of manufacturing in GDP of states like Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Goa was more than 15%, which was comparable to China and Thailand. Ficci, however, expressed concern over the slow rate of manufacturing growth, which was less than 3% between 1997-98 and 2005-05 in states like Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. These states are among the top 10 contributors to the manufacturing sector.

 

According to Ficci, a high rate of growth in the manufacturing sector will be needed in Maharashtra, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu to sustain 12% growth in the sector during the 11th Plan period

 

 
 
 

Maya plans advisory council with SC Mishra at its helm

Express news service

Lucknow, November 13 To accommodate close lieutenant Satish Chandra Mishra after he resigned from the Cabinet on Monday due to procedural compulsions, Chief Minister Mayawati plans to make him head of the yet-to-be-formed Uttar Pradesh State Advisory Council — a position that will restore to Mishra all the trappings of a Cabinet minister, red beacon et al.

 

Such a council will be formed for the first time in Uttar Pradesh after a similar council set up by former chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav — the Uttar Pradesh Development Council — was dissolved by Mayawati herself after she came to power. Mayawati had questioned the utility of such a council which had the powers to advise the state government on investment and industrial activities in the state. This council had Amar Singh as its chairman. However, the new body will give recommendations to the state on development and other issues too.

 

Mishra, a Rajya Sabha member from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), was sworn in as Cabinet minister on May 17 this year, four days after Mayawati took oath as Chief Minister. Mishra was not given any portfolio. Soon after being made a Cabinet minister, Mayawati had made it clear she would not send S C Mishra to any of the Houses.

 

A few months on, when allegations surfaced against Mishra that he had promoted the interests of his relatives, the Chief Minister came out openly in his defence. However, in September she announced that Mishra will step down from the Cabinet after six months and will be deployed in an organisational capacity.

 

BSP leaders said there was no option left for Mishra but to resign because he was not member of any of the Houses in the state Assembly. In Mulayam Singh’s Cabinet too, irrigation minister Merajuddin had to resign after he failed to get entry to a House. Meraj was minister from the Rashtriya Lok Dal’s (RLD) quota in the Mulayam Cabinet.

 

At the moment, there are no vacant seats in the Houses, either in the Assembly or in the legislative council. There will be 10 vacancies only in April next year but those will be seats reserved for teachers or graduate voters. When the Mayawati government was formed, there were two vacant seats in the legislative council. While one was occupied by Mayawati, she nominated close aide Swami Prasad Maurya to the other seat. BSP leaders, when contacted, confirmed that a council will be formed but also said that S C Mishra will spend more time away in other states where elections are due.


Online edition of India’s National Newspaper
Tuesday, Nov 13, 2007

 

Be wary of the enemy within: Rahul

Special Correspondent

 

LUCKNOW: All-India Congress Committee general secretary Rahul Gandhi said here on Monday that the biggest threat to the party was from the “enemy within.” He emphasised that the only opposition to the Congress was its incapability to represent people, and biggest drawback — failure to connect with people.

 

The Amethi Member of Parliament, who attended the first meeting of the Uttar Pradesh Congress Coordination Committee, stressed on connectivity with people and accountability to bring the Congress back on the rails.

Talking to mediapersons after the meeting, he pointed out that organisational weaknesses were the bane of the party which had kept it out of power in the State for 18 years.

 

Mr. Gandhi said that all these years the party was unable to attract youth. He would endeavour to make youth the vehicle of accountability. He wanted more youth inducted into the party.

 

While asserting that he did not believe in vote banks and cared little what the Bahujan Samaj Party and other parties were doing in the State, he said every talented youth should have the ability to enter politics. Besides, the party should be able to take up people’s issues.

 

On the perennial problem of factionalism and groupism plaguing the party in the State, Mr. Gandhi felt that this could be overcome by fixing accountability and displaying the propensity to identify with people.

 

The coordination committee, attended by 31 members, including Mr. Gandhi, lasted for four hours. Mr. Gandhi gave a patient hearing to the views and suggestions of the committee members.

 

In fact, at his behest the meeting agreed to organise the general body meeting of the Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee in Kanpur by December-end or January next.

Mr. Gandhi would be present at the two-day meeting. Its concluding session will be addressed by party president and United Progressive Alliance chairperson Sonia Gandhi.

Thereafter, a public meeting will be held in the industrial metropolis.

 

Mr. Gandhi met the members of 16 delegations drawn from former MPs. MLAs, frontal units and party cells.

This was Mr. Gandhi’s first visit to the Nehru Bhawan, headquarters of the Pradesh Congress Committee, where the day’s programme was held. Mr. Gandhi spent the entire day at the office.

 

Signalling its intent to take on the Bahujan Samaj Party government, the Congress has decided to convert an issue related to alleged insult of Mahatma Gandhi by a ruling party functionary into a State-wide agitation.

 


Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Wednesday, Nov 14, 2007

 

Pawar defends fresh wheat import tender

 

New Delhi, Nov. 13 The Union Agriculture and Food Minister, Mr Sharad Pawar, on Tuesday, defended the floating of a fresh wheat import tender on Government account, even while noting that domestic prices are ruling lower compared to last year.

 

Addressing the Economic Editors’ Conference here, Mr Pawar said wheat, in the wholesale market, was currently selling at around Rs 1,070 a quintal in Delhi, against over Rs 1,120 during this period last year.

 

But the Government was still keen to import up to 10 lakh tonnes (lt) — over and above 55 lt in 2006-07, and the 13-lt already contracted during the current fiscal — “as we have to build up a sufficient buffer stock to meet any emergency”.

The Government, he added, was committed to protect the interests of farmers, but “we cannot also bypass the interest of consumers”.

 

Delay in crushing

 

Mr Pawar also referred to the delay in starting of crushing operations by sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh (UP), which, in turn, was preventing farmers to harvest cane and sow wheat in the vacated area (Mills have refused to crush, citing high State Advised Prices of cane fixed by the UP Government and taking the matter to the Allahabad High Court. The latter has reserved its judgment, having concluded its hearings on Monday).

 

“We cannot take any risks and imports have to be resorted to ensure that the public distribution system is not starved of foodgrains,” Mr Pawar stated.

 

MMTC Ltd, on Monday, floated a global tender for import of 3.5 lt of wheat for delivery before February 10.

This is part of the total 10 lt to be imported on Government account by MMTC, State Trading Corporation of India (STC) and PEC Ltd. Asked whether there were plans to import beyond 10 lt, Mr Pawar said, “I do not think that will be required”.

 

Wheat is currently quoting at over $7.6 a bushel ($280 a tonne) at the Chicago Board of Trade, with the January contract at the Euronext.liffe exchange similarly ruling at €215 or $316 a tonne. Adding freight and other handling costs would translate into a landed cost of around $375 a tonne.

 

As on October 1, wheat stocks in the Central pool, at 101.21 lt, stood below the normative minimum buffer of 110 lt for this date. Rice stocks, at 54.89 lt, were marginally above the buffer norm of 52 lt.

 

Meanwhile, official rice procurement during the ongoing 2007-08 marketing season (October-September) has touched 82.49 lt as on Tuesday. This is lower than the 87.81-lt bought during the corresponding period of the 2006-07 season.

 

Bonus for paddy

 

When asked whether the Centre was planning to grant an additional bonus for paddy — over and above the already announced Rs 50 on a minimum support price of Rs 645 per quintal for common and Rs 675 for Grade ‘A’ varieties — Mr Pawar stated: “The Government has not taken any final decision on this”.

 

UP shows success in anti-polio drive
14 Nov 2007, 0307 hrs IST,TNN

 

LUCKNOW: Uttar Pradesh has shown a remarkable improvement on the front of polio eradication this year. The Lucknow and Kanpur sub-regions have recorded only four cases of P1 polio viruses transmission and five cases of P3 virus so far.
 

Addressing Polio workers at a ceremony to mark the occasion Dr Nimal Hettiaratchy, state representative, UNICEF, UP said, “Uttar Pradesh is close to eradicating polio and we know we can do it. Here your role is most significant. We should not be complacent. We have to walk that extra mile to achieve the goal of ‘a polio-free India’.”

 

UNICEF is involved in eradicating polio from the state through its frontline polio workers or community mobilisation coordinators (CMCs). The immediate concern now is to deal with families who have missed polio doses in CMC areas in Farrukhabad, Sitapur and Faizabad.

 

The routine immunization is also needed to be strengthened to increase the percentage of fully immunised children in the CMC areas of Farrukhabad, Kannauj and Hardoi.

 

Speaking on the occasion, assistant chief medical officer, Lucknow, Jai Singh said, “Better coordination between
UNICEF and government is the way to make progress in the field of polio eradication.”

 

The function was attended by hundreds of CMCs who were enthusiastic about their role and accomplishment. Rekha, a CMC, said, “It feels great to see that our hard work has borne fruit and today we are celebrating the occasion.”

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