Blooming Tree School, Janakpuri, celebrated its fifth annual day with great fervour recently at Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan Auditorium. The function began with Ganesh Vandana and lighting of the lamp by the chief guest and eminent educationist, lata Vaidyanathan. Over 250 students aged between two to four years performed at the event. It was a colourful extravaganza of activities and drama with foot tapping music and enthralling dance sequences . The children looked resplendent in their colourful costumes. The musical production titled Joy Ride was a story about a boy who never stopped dreaming and whose dream was finally fulfilled. The play concluded with the words of Walt Disney: “Dreams do come true for those who have the courage to pursue them.” Vaidyanathan and parents were overwhelmed by the mesmerising performances of the children. Parents and grandparents lauded the efforts of the staff and students.
Set the benchmark
A seminar titled Standards — A tool for effective library Management was organised by Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS). Jawahar Sircar, CEO, Prasar Bharti said, “The need for connecting libraries as ‘knowledge portals’ for facilitating easy access and overcoming the difficulties encountered during library management at various stages is the need of the hour.” BIS has formulated about 70 Indian standards relevant to library management in the areas of documentation and information, namely — bibliography, cataloguing, microform, data elements and interchange formats, library statistics guide, micrographics et al.
Good days ahead
Vijay Sampla, Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment inaugurated an awareness-cum-loan distribution camp organised by the National Safai Karamcharis Finance and Development Corporation (NSKFDC) recently at Chowka Ghat, Varanasi. During the camp about 681 safai karamcharis from Varanasi and nearby districts of UP were provided loan sanction letters of `186.37 lakh for various self employment projects as per their choice under Mahila Samridhi Yojana and Micro Credit Finance Schemes.
Vijay Sampla emphasised the need to mechanise the sanitation work so that safety and security of sanitation workers can be ensued and work is done in a dignified way. While mentioning the relevance of Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan launched by Narendra Modi, he also appreciated the new scheme of Swachhta Udyami Yojana launched by the National Safai Karamcharis Finance and Development Corporation earlier in the year. Under Swachhta Udyami Yojana, safai karamcharis and liberated manual scavengers can start ‘Pay and Use’ toilets or take assistance for purchase of sanitation related vehicles.
On this occasion, the Minister of State also launched another scheme of Sanitary Mart. Safai karamcharis can start sanitary mart with a total cost upto `15 lakh for which concessional loan at 4 per cent per annum would be provided. The marts would sell sanitation related items like phenyl, brooms, soaps, dusters and material used in construction of toilet et al.
A joint effort
In a significant step towards augmenting the domestic urea capacity, four PSUs — GAIl (India) limited, Coal India limited (CIl), Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilisers (RCF) and Fertilizer Corporation of India limited (FCIl) — signed Joint Ventures Agreements (JVAs) to set up an integrated coal gasification cum fertiliser and ammonium nitrate complex at Talcher, Odisha.
The JVAs were signed in the presence of Ananth Kumar, Union Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers; Dharmendra Pradhan, Union Minster of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas; Piyush Goyal, Union Minister of State for Power, Coal and New and Renewable Energy and Hansraj Gangaram Ahir, Union Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilisers.
JV1, GAIl Coal Gas (India) limited shall be led by GAIl and will be responsible for setting up upstream coal gasification and gas purification section for production of ammonia syngas for downstream fertiliser unit at an estimated investment of `3,000 crore. JV-2, Talcher Chemicals and Fertilizers limited, shall be led by RCF and will be responsible for setting up ammonia-urea, nitric acid-ammonium nitrate plants at an estimated investment of `6,000 crore with majority stake held by RCF and CIl. Pre-project activities are also been undertaken by them.
The project comprises 3,850 MTPD urea plants, 2,700 MTPD ammonia plants, 850 MTPD nitric acid plants and 1,000 MTPD ammonium nitrate plants. A suitable coal block for supplying coal to the project in the vicinity of the complex is being identified on priority basis by the Indian Government. The project is of strategic importance for India as it aims to make breakthrough for an alternative source of feedstock. As per available statistics, the total coal reserves in the country are around 300 billion tonnes with recoverable reserve of 173 billion tonnes. Thus potential exists for converting these reserves into value added products for use by fertiliser and power plants at affordable prices.