Asia’s First BIO-Safety Level –IV Laboratory to the Nation

Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare, Shri Ghulam Nabi Azad dedicated to the Nation the Asia’s First Bio-Safety Level-IV Laboratory established by ICMR with support from Department of Science & Technology at Pune today. 

Lab marks the end of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of NIVNational Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune has done tremendous work on Research and Management of infectious agents including viruses, Pune and starting of the 60th year of its glorious existence

*A biosafety level is the level of the biocontainment precautions required to isolate dangerous biological agents in an enclosed facility. The levels of containment range from the lowest biosafety level 1 (BSL-1) to the highest at level 4 (BSL-4)

Biosafety level 1

This level is suitable for work involving well-characterized agents not known to consistently cause disease in healthy adult humans, and of minimal potential hazard to laboratory personnel and the environment.

Biosafety level 2

This level is similar to Biosafety Level 1 and is suitable for work involving agents of moderate potential hazard to personnel and the environment.^[7] It includes various bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as C. difficile, most Chlamydiae, hepatitis A, B, and C,orthopoxviruses (other than smallpox), influenza A, Lyme disease, Salmonella, mumps, measles, ^[8] scrapie, MRSA, and VRSA. BSL-2 differs from BSL-1 in that:

Biosafety level 3

Researcher at US Centers for Disease Control, Bethesda, Maryland, working with influenza virus in biosafety level 3 conditions, with respirator and fume hood (BSC).

This level is applicable to clinical, diagnostic, teaching, research, or production facilities in which work is done with indigenous or exotic agents which may cause serious or potentially lethal disease after inhalation.^[7] It includes various bacteria, parasites and viruses that can cause severe to fatal disease in humans but for which treatments exist, such as Leishmania donovani,Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Bacillus anthracis, Chlamydia psittaci, West Nile virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus, Eastern equine encephalitis virus, SARS coronavirus, Salmonella typhi, Coxiella burnetii, Rift Valley fever virus, Rickettsia rickettsii, andyellow fever virus.

Biosafety level 4

This level is required for work with dangerous and exotic agents that pose a high individual risk of aerosol-transmitted laboratory infections, agents which cause severe to fatal disease in humans for which vaccines or other treatments are not available, such asBolivian and Argentine hemorrhagic fevers, Marburg virus, Ebola virus, Lassa virus, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, smallpox, and various other hemorrhagic diseases.

Achievements and Initiatives of the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment for the Year 2012 Department of Social Justice & Empowerment

The Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment is entrusted with the empowerment of the disadvantaged and marginalized sections of the society. The target groups of the Ministry are: (i) scheduled Castes, (ii) Other Backward Classes, (iii) Senior Citizens and (iv) Victims of Substance Abuse.

Elimination of Manual Scavenging

New law for prohibition of Employment of Manual Scavengers and their rehabilitation

In pursuance of the National Advisory Council’s resolution of 23.10.10 and its recommendations dated 25.5.2011, regarding eradication of manual scavenging,  the Cabinet, in its meeting held on 23.8.2012, approved the introduction of a new Bill, namely,  "The Prohibition of Employment of Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Bill, 2012", in Parliament.  The Bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha, which has been referred by the House to the Standing Committee of the Parliament

Social Defence

National Council of Senior Citizens (NCSrC)

 Drug Abuse Prevention

Celebration of International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking on 26^th June, 2012

Department of Disability Affairs

Creation of a new Department of Disability Affairs

A new Department of Disability Affairs has been set up vide Cabinet Secretariat’s notification dated 12.05.2012.   The Department has been allocated twenty five (25) subjects.  Creation of a new Department would ensure greater focus on policy matters to effectively address disability issues.  Having a separate budget would help in strengthening existing schemes, formulation of new schemes as also promotion of technological innovation in the sector. It would further boost greater coordination among stakeholders, organizations, state governments and related central ministries.

Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowship Scheme for Students with Disabilities

Year End Review of Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (india year book 2012-2013)

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) is the nodal Ministry of the Government of India for all matters relating to new and renewable energy. The broad aim of the Ministry is to develop and deploy new and renewable energy for supplementing the energy requirements of the country. 

A total power generation capacity of around 26,267 MW from renewable has been setup in the country as on 31.10.2012. A target of adding about 30,000 MW from various renewable energy sources has been fixed for the 12^th Plan period.

Important 

pv photo voltic

Solar Mission

Under the National Solar Mission, 11 projects of 50.50 MW capacity  (48 MW PV + 2.5  MW ST) under migration scheme, 26 projects of 130 MW capacity under Batch-I and 69 projects totaling 88.80 MW of small capacity power projects (RPSSGP Programme) have been commissioned.  In all, a total capacity of over 1045 MW Grid connected Solar Power Projects have been commissioned in the country as on 31.10.2012.

Physical progress:      Physical Achievements made under major programmes are given below. 

Renewable Energy Programme/ Systems	Target for 2012-13	Deployment during November,2012		Total Deployment in  2012-13	Cumulative achievement up to 30.11.2012
I.   POWER FROM RENEWABLES:
A.   GRID-INTERACTIVE POWER      (CAPACITIES IN MW)
Wind Power	2500	46.30	968.45		18321.10
Small Hydro Power	350	13.10	69.28		3464.59
Biomass Power	105 350	16.00	92.50		1242.60
Bagasse Cogeneration		24.00	214.00		2199.23
Waste to Power                     -Urban	20	-	4.00		93.68
-Industrial		-	-		-
Solar Power (SPV)	800	2.00	105.88		1047.16
Total	4125.00	101.40	1454.11		26368.36
B.    OFF-GRID/ CAPTIVE POWER        (CAPACITIES IN MWEQ)
Waste to Energy                   -Urban -Industrial	20.00	0.36	9.36		111.10
Biomass(non-bagasse) Cogeneration	60.00	7.00	41.44		423.94
Biomass Gasifiers                 -Rural- Industrial	1.50	0.384	0.512		16.632
	10.00	0.60	4.57		138.65
Aero-Genrators/Hybrid systems	0.50	-	0.10		1.74
SPV Systems (>1kW)	30.00	-	13.60		103.81
Water mills/micro hydel	2.00(500 Nos.)	-	(68 nos)		2121 Nos.
Total	126.00	8.344	69.582		795.872
II. REMOTE VILLAGE ELECTRIFICATION
No. of Remote Village/Hamlets provided with RE Systems	-	-	-		-
III. OTHER RENEWABLE ENERGY SYSTEMS
Family Biogas Plants (No. inlakhs)	1.25	-	-		45.45
Solar Water Heating - Coll. Areas (Million m2)	0.60	0.12	0.61		6.07

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Year End Review of Power Ministry (india year book 2012-2013)

The Indian power sector is one of the most diversified in the world. India is the fifth largest producer of electricity in the world and according to the Planning Commission, while the State Governments account for 51.5% of the total generation capacity, the central sector and the private sector account for 33.1% and 15.4% of the generation capacity respectively. 

Sources for power generation range from commercial sources like coal, lignite, natural gas, oil, hydro and nuclear power to other viable non-conventional sources like wind, solar and agriculture and domestic waste. The capacity addition achieved in the 11th plan has already surpassed the achievement of the earlier plans. A capacity of 54,964 MW has been added which has a significant contribution from the private sector and the government is making serous efforts to achieve a much higher capacity addition of about 88,000 MW in 12th plan. The contribution of private sector in capacity addition has increased from 10% in the 10th plan to approx 42% in the 11th plan and during 12th plan; it is expected to be more than 50%. A capacity addition target of 17956 MW has been fixed for 2012-13. 

To ensure that the benefits of the increased availability of power reaches the poorest of the poor living in the rural areas, the Government has implemented the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana with vigour and determination to electrify over one lakh un-electrified villages and to provide free electricity connection to 2.34 crore rural BPL households.

Bharat Nirman targets for electrification of villages and provision of electricity connections to BPL households have been met. 
National Energy Conservation Award Scheme- 2012. The President also presented the prizes to 13 winners of the National Level Painting Competition under the National Campaign on Energy Conservation undertaken by the Ministry of Power and Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE)


Restructured Accelerated Power Development and Reform Program (R-APDRP):

The actual focus of the R-APDRP program is on demonstration of performance in terms of reduction in Aggregate technical & commercial losses. Projects under this scheme are to be taken up in two parts: 

Year-End-Review of the Ministry of Civil Aviation for the Year 2012(india year book 2012-2013)

Civil Aviation has been identified as one of the most important growth engines essential for the economic growth of the country. Besides providing air transport for passengers and goods, it facilitates growth of trade and commerce, domestic and foreign investments, transfer of technology, creation of infrastructure, domestic and international tourism and generation of employment etc.

Air transport in India has witnessed enormous growth in the recent past. During the last 10 years, compounded annual growth rate of passenger traffic has been approximately 15%. A key trend in the business model of the Indian Carriers in the domestic operations is that the domestic traffic is rapidly shifting to Low Cost Carriers (LCC). From a level of about 1% in 2003-2004, the market share of LCC including the LCC arm of full service carriers is today exceeding 70% of the total domestic traffic.

India is likely to be the fastest growing aviation market in the world in the next 20 years. Estimates suggest that the domestic air traffic will touch 160–180 million passengers per annum in the next 10 years and the international traffic will exceed 80 million passengers per annum from the current level of 60 million domestic and 40 million international passengers respectively. According to International Air Transport Association’s Airline Industry Forecast 2012-2016,India's domestic air travel market would be among the top five globally, experiencing the second highest growth rate.

Keeping this in mind, a number of steps have been taken by the Government to accelerate the pace of growth of airline industry in the country. These have been summarized as follows

1.    EXPANSION AND UPGRADATION OF AIRPORTS:

At present 5 major airports are being operationalized under PPP mode at New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Cochin.

Declaration of Tiruchirapalli, Coimbatore, Mangalore, Varanasi and Lucknow airports as International airports: So far there were 17 international airports. Five new airports at Tiruchirapalli, Coimbatore, Mangalore, Varanasi and Lucknow have been added to the list this year.

2.    TURN AROUND  / FINANCIAL RESTRUCTURING PLANS OF AIR INDIA:

3.      FDI BY FOREIGN AIRLINES IN INDIAN CIVIL AVIATION:

The Government has allowed 49% FDI by the foreign airlines in the domestic carriers.

4.      ALLOCATION OF INTERNATIONAL TRAFFIC RIGHTS 

5.    INITIATIVES IN THE AREA OF AIR NAVIGATION SYSTEMS

Navigation: AAI has installed 66 Instrument landing systems and 93 VOR/DME which provide navigational guidance to aircraft. In addition, Satellite Based Navigation System (SBAS) called GPS Aided Geo Augmented Navigation (GAGAN) system is being jointly developed and implemented by Airports Authority of India (AAI) and Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). The GAGAN is designed to provide the improved accuracy, availability, and integrity necessary to enable users to rely on GPS for all phases of flight, from en route through approach for all qualified airports within the GAGAN service volume. GAGAN will also provide increased positional accuracy of aircraft thereby permitting enhanced safety and operational efficiency. The system will be commissioned by June 2013. India is the fourth country in the world, after USA, JAPAN and Europe to take up the challenge of establishing the regional SBAS Navigation System which will redefine the navigation over Indian airspace and other states falling in the footprint of GAGAN.

6.  SIMPLIFICATION OF PROCEDURE FOR SANCTION OF BUILDINGS AROUND AIRPORTS

7.    DOMESTIC OPERATIONS

8.    HELICOPTER CONNECTIVITY TO VRINDAVAN

9.    AIRCARFT ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BUREAU

Government has set up an Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau to efficiently investigate the accidents and to recommend effective corrective measures.

Skill augmentation in civil aviation sector through a vibrant, world class aviation education and training: In this regard, the work to establish a Civil Aviation University is under progress.