Philanthropist Bill Gates, Co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on Friday announced emergency relief of $700,000 for flood victims of Jammu & Kashmir. The help came in response to a request from Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh who hails from Jammu and Kashmir.
The announcement was made by Gates when he called on Singh here to discuss mutually shared areas of interest. Singh and Gates talked about shared areas of focus, including the existing Memorandum of Understanding between the Foundation and the Department of Biotechnology/Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) for their Grand Challenges initiative.
Gates met Union Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu too and two held extensive discussion on the magnitude of providing toilets to every household in the country, following which Ministry of Urban Development and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation agreed to decide to cooperate in four areas, viz., Innovative Technology Demonstration in respect of toilets and sewage management, Promoting decentralized sewerage systems that enable disposal of sewage at habitation level rather than pooling of sewage, Capacity building in sanitation sector and Promoting use of toilets.
The philanthropist duo also met Woman and Child Development Ministry Maneka Gandhi on Friday.
Maneka briefed them on the schemes undertaken by different wings of the Government to address malnutrition concerns in the country. She also told them about the real time monitoring of children and that their nutritional status continues to remain an area of concern for the Government.
The Minister also stressed on the need for training of Anganwadi workers and helpers (AWWs and AWHs) which are currently 25 lakh women to help women at large.
The duo assured her that the Bill Gates Foundation will be able to assist the Ministry in the areas of training and technical requirements for the National Mission on Nutrition as well as the ‘Beti Bachao Beti Padhao’ scheme, which is aimed at saving and educating girl children.