Further tightening the mode and method of governance, the Cabinet has decided to merger Industry and Mines and Geology Departments together. The new Department would be known as Industry, Mines and Geology Department.
The composite office would now have one specially designated official meant to and facilitate and route investments coming from national as well as international destinations to the State.
“The Cabinet has approved the proposal to merge Industry Department and Mines and Geology Departments into one. A secretary rank official would be posted as Investment Commissioner at New Delhi who would coordinate with different institutions in the order to attract national and international investments to the State,” said Additional Chief Secretary, Cabinet, NN Pandey on Thursday.
Also, two more posts of Secretaries in the Planning cum Finance Department have been carved out in the form of Secretary, Resources and Secretary, Expenditure. Pandey said that the officials would function under the Principal Secretary of the Department.
The Cabinet also decided to authorise the Rural Development Department to prepare a suitable proposal for the selection of officials as Deputy Development Commissioners. “The Department would come up with a proposal before the Cabinet and after getting approved, new selection criteria would be in place for the appointments of the DDCs in districts. Also, the DDCs are being designated as District Programme Coordinator for MGNREGA and soon a notification would be issued in this regard,” said the official.
Also, in those blocks where a single officer is holding the posts of Block Development Officer as well as Circle Officer, he/she would now be conferred with powers of the both. The decision would ensure presence of BDO and CO in every block of the State and smoothen the administrative functionality there.
This apart, the Cabinet decided to form tourism authorities for Parashnath and Rajrappa. Tourism Secretary would be chairperson of the authorities while DC of that particular district would be deputy chairperson cum managing director. Six directors with experience in the field of tourism would come from NGOs and would be selected through open selection process and interview.
“The Cabinet has also waived condition of 70 per cent BPl beneficiaries in Women SHGs to get assistance under National Rural livelihood Mission.
“With this, now presence of NRlM would be felt in every block of the State. It has been targeted to cover 80 blocks in 2015-16, 120 in 2016-17, 160 in 2017-18, 200 in 2018-19 and all 259 in 2019-20 from the centrally sponsored programme,” said Pandey.
June 17, 2015 has been fixed as cut-off date for beneficiaries to submit their proof of residing in any urban slum, their voter ID, bank account and Aadhaar in order to get shelter under the Prime Minister Awas Yojna. Also, a MoU between National Disaster Management Authority and State Government would be signed to share administrative costs and hiring resource personnel at State and district level disaster management authorities.