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Shun expansion of slums

Young Bites. Dated: 12/6/2017 10:24:55 AM

The tourism tag has placed always the State of J&K in the limelight at the national as well as international levels. Our tourism products are well known. All out efforts are being made to increase the tourist inflow in the state as more the arrival of tourists, more economic activity gets generated which have multiplier effect on the income levels of the large chunk of population dependent on this sector. The developmental strategy on tourism sector has primarily centered on development of tourism infrastructure, enhancement of private investment through attractive incentive structure, opening of new tourist destinations and proactive publicity campaign. Focused attention on timely completion of infrastructure projects has yielded results. The delivery of healthcare services to the public at large witnessed significant expansion. There has been improvement in terms of infrastructure, machinery/equipments, manpower etc. which helped in rejuvenating the healthcare system and restoring faith of the public in the system. Steps taken by the Department to enhance the accountability and transparency including professional audit, referral audit, and prescription audit have already started yielding positive results.Literacy is essential for reducing child mortality, curbing population growth, achieving gender equality, eradicating poverty and ensuring sustainable development, peace and democracy. At the time of Independence, the literacy rate of the state was only five per cent. With the planned interventions and sustained efforts, considerable progress has been made in the State in the field of literacy. The interventions of SSA and RMSA have had its positive impact in improving, upgrading and strengthening the school infrastructure, widening access base and ensuring equity with focus on weaker sections of the society. As regards higher education, the main thrust is on consolidation and quality improvement/ skill development, improvement in faculty, focus on research and monitoring, increase in gross enrolment ratio & capacity expansion, ICT coverage of all universities & colleges, and facilitating private investment including PPP. There is a trend towards fast migration of population from rural areas to urban area in search of jobs and to avail other facilities. The urban planning thus needs to be addressed in an integrated manner to avoid development of slums in the state. The State Government’s vision is to facilitate creation of economically vibrant, inclusive, efficient, equitable and sustainable urban habitats which provides means of productive employment, dignified and a decent quality of life to all its inhabitants. The State is endowed with tremendous mineral resources. The State is focusing its attention to carry out mineral investigation of new items viz; lead, zinc, china clay and iron ore in the State and also to generate explanatory data on ground water investigation. The initiatives taken to make all the rigs to work for improving the drilling activities are yielding positive results. There has been substantial increase in the value of minor mineral extractions over the years. Sericulture is a farm based, labour intensive and commercially attractive economic activity falling under the cottage and small-scale sector and plays a significant role for ensuring inclusive growth.