Focus on agriculture, social welfare, women empowerment in district panchayat budget

A novel project to introduce the ‘Travancore Rice’ brand to aid farmers in the district is part of the Thiruvananthapuram district panchayat’s annual Budget for 2023-24.

A novel project to introduce the ‘Travancore Rice’ brand to aid farmers in the district is part of the Thiruvananthapuram district panchayat’s annual Budget for 2023-24.

District panchayat vice president A. Shailaja Begum on Wednesday presented the budget with a focus on agriculture, social welfare, women empowerment and promoting entrepreneurship, and showing a revenue of ₹825.81 crore, expenditure of ₹822.55 crore, and surplus of ₹3.25 crore. The revenue and expenditure figures are inclusive of the district budget for the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS).

As part of the plan to introduce the ‘Travancore Rice’ brand, the district panchayat will procure paddy from farmers in the district, process it and market it under its brand name. An amount of ₹1 crore has been set aside for the project. Paddy cultivation is currently being carried out in 2,130 hectares of land in the district.

The district panchayat had earlier floated an Agricultural Labour Farming Co-operative Society and a labour bank. In the next financial year, 100 hi-tech farms are proposed to be developed in the district. Allocations have also been made for the Keragramam project to promote coconut cultivation and Kedaram project to promote paddy cultivation. An amount of ₹4.81 crore has been allocated for the agriculture sector in the Budget, while an amount of ₹7 crore has been earmarked for animal husbandry and dairy development.

As part of the ‘Gramavandi’ project with the KSRTC to ensure more bus services to remote regions within the district, an amount of ₹2 crore has been allocated. An amount of ₹2 crore has been allocated for installation of solar panels in schools, hospitals and other institutions under the district panchayat, as part of the carbon neutral district project.

A total of ₹5.5 crore has been allocated for women-oriented projects as part of the Budget. Financial aid will be provided to women involved in traditional occupations for entrepreneurship initiatives. Fund has been allocated for women to launch food processing units in all the 26 divisions of the district panchayat. The ‘Snehitha’ project focussing on mental health for teenage girls will continue this year too. The ‘Grihashree’ project aims at providing mobile sales van for selling products manufactured by Kudumbashree units in all divisions.

An amount of ₹3.28 crore has been set aside for the Padheyam project, which the district panchayat launched in 2017 to ensure a hunger-free district. The Budget also envisages projects for skill and job training as well as distribution of e-auto for transgender persons. Skill training projects as well as projects to improve educational levels are also proposed for Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Caste beneficiaries.