Kollam gets 10,765 houses under PMAY

The Union governmenthas allocated 10,765 houses in the rural areas of Kollam under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, N.K. Premachandran, MP, has said.

He was chairing a meeting of the District Development Coordination and Monitoring Committee (DISHA) constituted for the implementation and review of various Central projects.

The meeting decided to expedite the intensive drive to make Kollam tuberculosis(TB)-free by 2025. The target of eliminating TB will be achieved if less than one TB case is reported in every 1,00,000 people screened. A total of 54 NAAT testing centres and 54 microscopy centres have been set up in the district for screening. TB testing is completely free and medicines costing up to ₹650 per month are completely free for six months. Patients with multi-drug resistant TB require 9 to 12 months of treatment.

The treatment costing around ₹20 lakh is completely free and the entire medical expenses will be fully borne by the government. A person once diagnosed with TB will be given free treatment and ₹500 per month until the disease is completely cured. Free IGRA test facility has also been introduced in all taluk hospitals for TB diagnosis. Free treatment will provided for diabetes associated with tuberculosis also. Speaking at the meeting, the MP said that public participation should be ensured for the success of the campaign.

POCSO cases

The committee also decided to demand State and Central governments to take measures for assessing the reasons for the decrease in the conviction rate of POCSO (Protection of Children from Sexual Offences) Act cases in the district and take action and implement a special project to spread awareness among the students from Class VIII to XII about the traps in social media leading to POCSO cases.

At present, the condition to transfer the subsidy amount granted by the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Programme to the account of the beneficiary is that an external agency appointed by the Union government should conduct an inspection and submit a report. The committee observed that there is a situation where the beneficiaries are not getting the subsidy amount on time as the reporting agency has been suspended and a new agency has not been appointed. It was decided to take immediate action to transfer the subsidy amount to the beneficiaries.

The committee decided to demand changes on the e-SAKSHI portal so that there will not be any delays in the timely utilisation of funds coming under the Members of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme (MPLADS).

Paravur municipality chairperson P. Sreeja, Kunnathur grama panchayat president Valsala Kumari, Thrikovilvattam grama panchayat president G S Sindhu, MP Kodikunnil Suresh’s representative P. Harikumar, project director B Sreebash and other officials attended the meeting.

Published - October 05, 2024 07:57 pm IST