Uttar Pradesh government in collaboration with the Union Panchayati Raj ministry would be celebrating this year’s National Panchayati Raj Day here on Monday which will be inaugurated by chief minister Yogi Adityanath. Union Minister for Rural Development, Panchayati Raj and Drinking water and sanitation Narendra Singh Tomar will preside over the function while Union Minister of State, Panchayati Raj Parshottan Rupala along with others would be present on the occasion.
UP panchayati raj minister Bhupendra Chaudhury said that 209 people of the panchayats would be conferred with the national awards like Deendayal Upadhyay Panchayat Sashaktikaran Puraskar and, Nanaji Deshmukh Rashtriya Gaurav Gram Sabha Puraskar for strengthening the Panchayati Raj Institutions besides e-Panchayat Puraskars would be given to State Governments. Chaudhury said around 3000 delegates from different panchayats in the country would be present during the function. During the National Panchayat Raj Day event at lucknow the Panchayati raj ministry would launch the You-Tube Channel with short films on Best Practices and schemes of Government of India. Besides it would share the audio-visual capacity building content for Panchayati Raj Institutions through instant messaging apps over smart phones to elected members of Panchayats. It will also release the quarterly magazine with QR codes and its online version for access to PRIs over mobile phones.
A Mobile App (mobile application software) of “Gramoday Sankalp” news magazine will also be launched on National Panchayati Raj Day. This magazine will be distributed through three Ministries Ministry of Panchayati Raj, Rural Development and Drinking Water and Sanitation. This news magazine will be launched in Hindi, English and other regional languages. “It is expected that this newsletter will act as a vehicle for direct communication between the Policy makers and Gram Panchayats,” Chauhan said. The minister said that The Constitution (73 rd Amendment) Act, 1992 that came into force with effect from 24th April, 1993 has vested constitutional status on Panchayati Raj institutions. “This date thus marks a defining moment in the history of decentralization of political power to the grassroots level. Accordingly, the Government of India decided in consultation with the States to celebrate 24 th April as National Panchayati Raj Day,” he said.