Saturday 27 May 2017

32 per cent of rural Telangana depends on ration for rice

Telangana, AP Petrol bunks to stay open on sundays

Hyderabad: Petrol pumps in Telugu states will not observe a holiday on Sunday from May 14. The single shift functioning - from 6 am to 6 pm on weekdays from May 15 - has also been put off as dealers have decided to defer their agitation and function as usual.

Petrol dealers in eight states, including TS and AP, had announced an agitation, demanding increase in dealers’ commission. However, dealers said they would still meet on May 16 and 17 to decide their future course of action.

Rajiv Amaram, president, Telangana Petroleum Dealers’ Association, said: “We have decided to put off the agitation for now keeping in view the public inconvenience. We will come out with our future course of action on May 18.”

The Confederation of Indian Petroleum Dealers Association had given a call to petrol pumps to observe every Sunday as holiday from May 14 and work in single shift, from 6 am to 6 pm, from May 15 on week days. The TS and AP dealers had extended support to the agitation.

However, the association gave a contrasting reason for strike. First, it claimed that the strike was called demanding increase in commission for dealers. Later, it said it was done in response to the call given by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on conservation of fuel through his Mann Ki Baat programme.

However, the union petroleum ministry took serious view of this issue and warned dealers of stringent action if they resorted to closure of pumps or worked single shift in the name of agitations.

However, Mr. Amaram maintained they were suffering huge losses due to lower commission offered by OMCs on sale of fuel and the Centre had promised in November 2016 to “increase our commission within a month”. “We are forced to close pumps on Sundays and work in single shift during weekdays to cut down our operational costs. Unless the Centre keeps its promise of increasing commission, it is not possible to have the pumps function as usual. We are hopeful of the Centre addressing our issues. at the earliest.

We will meet on May 16 and 17 to devise our future course of action," he said.

tsdigitalindia

Telangana govt's Muslim employees can leave early in Ramzan

Hyderabad: Muslim employees of the Telangana government will be allowed to leave offices early by an hour during the holy month of Ramzan.

The TRS government on Friday issued a circular in this regard. The festival begins from May 27.

In the circular, Chief Secretary SP Singh said the government has permitted “all its employees belonging to Muslim religion, including teachers and outsourcing staff

members, to leave their offices/schools at 4PM on all working days during the holy month of Ramzan, from May 27 to June 25, to perform necessary rituals".

The permission is given except when the presence of employees is ‘required due to exigencies of services during the said period’, the circular said.

tsdigitalindia

Telangana No 1 in digital transactions in the country: minister KT Rama Rao

Hyderabad: Urban Development and Information Technology minister of Telangana KT Rama Rao on Monday said Telangana stands number one in the country in the number of digital transactions.

He asserted that Telangana is today at the cusp of a digital revolution.

"This stands testimony to the digital prowess of the state. We are creating the requisite infrastructure, we are skilling our youngsters and we are promoting innovation," he added.

Rao who participated in the inaugural ceremony ICT4D, an ICRISAT annual conference said that this initiative of Telangana Government is a revolutionary and transformative project that aims to democratize access to internet and also increase transparency by providing all government services online.

"The Fiber-Grid Project is a novel initiative, which was not attempted anywhere in the country - perhaps not attempted anywhere in the world. The project aims to piggyback on the drinking water grid project and attempts to connect every household in the state with Optic Fiber," he said.

Rao said the citizens of this state will not only get clean drinking water but are also connected to a fibre optic grid.

"Once this is complete, it will open up a plethora of opportunities and will transform the landscape of this state. Services ranging from e-health to e-education would then be delivered at the door step of the citizen.

New business models that evolve based on the Fiber Grid infrastructure, will also generate substantial employment for the youngsters of this state," he added.

He also asserted that Telangana has one of country's most robust and comprehensive E-Governance initiatives.

"Taking E-Governance services to the next level, very soon the Telangana Government would be offering all these G2C Services via mobile apps too. Telangana state has also launched the e-panchayat initiative, which intends to offer a range of G2C, Financial, Insurance and other allied services at a Village Panchayat level. These are being operated by Women Village Level Entrepreneurs," Rao added.

"We understand that providing digital infrastructure and services has no meaning if citizens are not digitally literate. The state government has taken up an ambitious program to make one person in every family to be digitally literate," Rama Rao said.

While praising Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao, Rama Rao said, "Our Chief Minister firmly believes that technology which does not alleviate the problems of a common man is of no use. Couple of years back, Telangana government has established T-Hub, India's largest tech incubator. Here, young Indians are trying to come up with viable tech solutions in important sectors like Agriculture, CleanTech and Transportation. We are already seeing some promising solutions being developed at T-Hub."

He said the government is also actively collaborating with ICRISAT on a lot of initiatives, adding that one important initiative is the digital agriculture initiative, which aims to provide technology solutions to our farmers.

"Telangana is one of the first states to have launched exclusive policies for Data Analytics, Open Data, and Cyber Security. These policies are intended to aid research and development in these emerging sectors and also facilitate investments," he added.

Ram Rao made a special mention about their Open Date initiative launched recently.

"Telangana is only the second state in the country to come up with an Open Data Policy. The government of Telangana likes to share data proactively and we believe this data will then be used by enthusiasts to develop solutions and visualizations," Rao said.