This story is from July 11, 2016

Union minister Dr Harsh Vardhan lauds UP CM’s plantation drive

Union minister Dr Harsh Vardhan lauds UP CM’s plantation drive
Dr Harsh Vardhan - File photo
LUCKNOW: Giving a virtual thumbs up to the initiative of the Uttar Pradesh government to plant 5 crore saplings in a span of 24 hours, Union minister for Science & Technology and Earth Science, on Monday said that if any step taken by any person (or political party) is in the interest of the nation, society or environment, then there should be “no difference of opinion” on this front.

The Union minister who was in Lucknow to participate in the observational campaign to study the small-scale processes and large-scale monsoon variability under a joint Indo-UK effort, said, “The current government believes in “Rashtra Dharm” (where nation comes first). You are deliberately asking this question, as the initiative has been taken by the UP government and UP CM.”
Harsh Vardhan went on to add, “We do not represent narrow or parochial mindset, nor anyone in the government represent narrow or parochial mindset.” He further stated, “If any work or effort is in the interest of the country, society, environment and is helping in tackling the global warming and climate change, then there should be no difference of opinion (of any person).”
Elaborating further on the joint effort, Harsh Vardhan said that the current collaboration envisages precise monsoon prediction and observation. The National Monsoon Mission, which was started in 2012, would be completed in next 5 years, and a budgetary provision of Rs 400 crore has been made in this. “The Centre now wants to take this precise observation to block-level by the end of five year period,” Harsh Vardhan said, and added that more than 11.5 million farmers have benefitted, which was also praised by the NCAER.
To address the issue of better understanding of processes that drive the variability and predictability of South Asian monsoon, India and United Kingdom have embarked on an ambitious plan to carry out a major joint observational campaign involving the deployment of UK’s BAe-146-301 atmospheric research aircraft with sophisticated scientific instruments and India’s Sindhu Sadhna research ship during May-June 2016. The UK’s instrumented aircraft is a special aircraft which can fly at very low level (from 500 feet to 10 kilometres). The aircraft observation will be augmented by special observational programmes over the land using boundary layer of flux towers, radars and microwave radiometers.

This joint effort is part of the implementation agreement signed between Ministry of Earth Science and Natural Environment Research Council, UK on predicting the variability of the South Asian Monsoon. The Union minister also informed that India too would have such an atmospheric aircraft by the next 2 years, worth Rs 240 crore.
On the issue of compensation to farmers whose crops had been destroyed in hailstorm, the Union minister said that for the first time the percentage of crop damages have been brought down from 50% to 30%, thereby making the farmers eligible for compensation. “The PM himself has spoken to chief minister for hours to fix the problem, and added that the department had issued advisories about Chennai and Uttarakhand flash floods, but cannot stop it from happening.
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Arunav Sinha

Stories pertaining to political developments, their impact on the political landscape of the nation are of immense interest to me. Apart from this, I love to foray into stories, which demand a great deal of research and study.

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