April 20, 2014

West Bengal's Second Renaissance

Samprati Motghare
IIM graduate, Batch of 2014


The cultural heritage of West Bengal is one of the richest across the globe. The sanctity of Hooghly, the beauty of Eastern Himalayas, the diversity of Sunderbans and the freshness of the Tea Gardens, all blend together to constitute the unique culture of West Bengal.

The land of many legends, it gave the nation its National Anthem and National Song. It has always proved to be a place with a perfect blend of traditions and modernity.  But somewhere after the independence, it lost its place as a cultural leader and a thought provoker. The new government in the state wants to reclaim the lost glory.


Remembering the Titans

Tagore’s ideas for people: Various literary works of Swami Rabindranath Tagore have been compiled in 17 volumes and 7 of those volumes have already been published and made available to public.

Ceremonies: 150th birth anniversary celebrations of Swami Vivekananda and Dwijendralal Roy were organized at a large scale. Chetna Utsav was celebrated in each district of the state to mark the 150th birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda. Birth anniversaries of Kazi Nazrul Islam and Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose (first time ever in Darjeeling) were observed throughout the state. Tributes to around 200 great personalities have been paid through various functions held at the State Secretariat.

New Academies: Paschimbanga Kazi Nazrul Academy, Rajbanshi Bhasha Academy, Birsa Munda Academy and Hindi Academy have been formed in order to preserve and extend the languages and cultures of different ethnic groups of the state.

Re-construction in Technicians’ studio: 6 floors have been re-constructed in Technicians’ studio and have been named in the honour of Satyaijit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, Tapan Sinha, Uttam Kumar, Suchitra Sen and Rituparno Ghosh.


Promoting film and television

Film festivals: Kolkata International Film Festival received the support of West Bengal government to scale greater heights and for the first time ever a Children’s Film festival was also organized at the state level.

Film cities: For the first time in two comprehensive film cities are being constructed at Dabgram in Jalpaiguri and Baruipur in South 24 Paraganas.

Tele Academy: To develop television industry, first Tele Academy of the state has been formed. 90 eminent TV personalities have been awarded by Tele Samman award.


Support to artistes

Revitalizing folk artistes: 10,000 folk artistes have been identified and were provided financial support to develop and preserve folk culture of the state. Social messages were propagated through folk artistes about Child Marriage, Dowry problem and Kanyashree scheme etc.

Health cover: Close to 10,000 artistes and technicians, along with their families, from cinema and television industries have been brought under health insurance cover.

Pension scheme: A new scheme to provide social security to cultural personalities has been started and close to 150 have already availed this pension facility.


Preserving heritage and protecting creativity

Renovation: 32 Rabindra Bhabans and many heritage sites like University Institute Hall, Mahajati Sadan etc. are being renovated. Reconstruction of Nazrul Mancha has been completed.

Digitization of art work: Manuscripts and letters of eminent authors of Bengal have been completed by the government to preserve their heritage for years to come. Digitization of music, cinema, paintings and other art works is currently in progress.

New laws: Audio and video piracy act has been brought into force in the state to stop piracy and promote creativity and innovation. Also, Urdu, Hindi, Oriya, Santhali and Punjabi languages have been enlisted as official languages to promote these languages in the state.


West Bengal won the first prize for its tableau in this year’s Republic Day parade for depicting its folk culture through Chhau dance. Some artifacts belonging to Gupta period have been discovered in Medinipur. Around 350 artistes have been awarded by the state government across various fields of cultural spectrum. Other states could take out a leaf out of West Bengal’s book to promote their artistes and cultural heritage.

April 19, 2014

West Bengal transport sector surges ahead

Tanmay Mondal
IIM graduate, Batch of 2014


The transport sector is an important component of the economy impacting the development and the welfare of the people. The West Bengal Government in last 34 months has taken several measures to improve the infrastructure of the transport department, resulting in continuous improvement in revenue generation.


Administrative re-expansion and reform of the Transport Department

(i) For the benefit of common people and also with the view for decentralisation and speedy disposal of works, two new offices of Public Vehicles Department (PVD) have been opened at Salt lake & Kasba. With the same objective, a new motor vehicle office has been opened in each of the 18 sub-divisions across Bengal.

(ii) New branch offices of State Transport Authority, with the aim to speed up the works in 6 districts of North Bengal, have been opened. The tasks mentioned below can be done in these offices; there will be no need to visit the state level offices:

•    National permit (Goods carriage)
•    Temporary permit (Goods carriage)
•    State contract carriage permit -up to 3 districts
•    All Bengal carriage permit (only for transportation of tourists)

(iii) An integrated and centralized council has been set up for the management of CSTC, CTC & WBSTC

(iv) Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS) has been initiated for the employees of State Transport Corporations and in the first phase 850 employees of 4 State Transport Corporations have been included in the scheme

(v) Neutral & open-tender system has been started with the view to increase financial revenues and for the holistic usage of unused lands of State Transport Corporations


Bus-Tram services

•    More than thousand permits of Buses and Mini-buses have been issued and these have been done with the introduction of an easy and hassle-free system of issuing permits

•    More than a hundred Bus-services have been started under State Transport Corporations in new routes

•    Corporate AC Bus-services have been started in many long-distance routes

•    With the financial assistance of JNNURM, 632 new Bus-services in Kolkata Metropolitan areas, 80 in Asansol-Durgapur areas and 140 in Siliguri-Jalpaiguri areas have been started

•    AC tram-services have been started in traditional routes


Taxi Services

•    Taxi permits for 4000 `No refusal` AC and non-AC new taxis are being issued in Kolkata Metropolitan areas

•    Pre-paid taxi service has been started from Railway stations of Kolkata, Howrah, Sealdah & Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport.


Air Services

•    Regular Helicopter-services have been started between Kolkata and Gangasagar, Bolpur and Santiniketan and from Durgapur, Malda and Balurghat. Facility for pleasure trips on air are also on offer. For this, Pawan Hans Ltd, an India Govt. undertaking, has been appointed on contract basis to make the services available.

•    State Govt. has been providing assistance in many ways to Airports authority of India for the restoration of the regular Air-services between Kolkata & Cooch Behar again; it is also constructing a new culvert on Mora- Torsha to facilitate landing of heavy aero-planes.

•    Government has allowed tax-concessions to help more aero-planes taking flights from Bagdogra, Cooch Behar & Durgapur, State Govt. will not impose taxes if they avail of turbine fuels from these three airports.


Inland Waterways services

•    New launch services have been started on the Shree Ramakrishna-Ma Sarada-Vivekananda heritage route

•    Pleasure trips or river Hooghly

•    Cargo movement through waterways between South 24 Paraganas & East Medinipur

•    New ferry service on PPP model on river Ganga - for this additional 06 launches have been brought


Transport infrastructure

•    Flyover between Nagerbazer and Dum Dum is now open

•    A ramp has been constructed to descend on AJC Bose Road

•    Necessary fund has been allotted to construct 14 jetties and for renovation & development of these jetties

•    Fund has been sanctioned for construction of 29 Bus-stands and terminuses and also for renovation and development of these

•    Necessary fund has been sanctioned for the construction of Bus-stands in districts


Revenue

•    Generation of revenues from transport sector is on the rise for succeeding years now. Revenue generation for the financial year 2011-12 was Rs 986.04 crore, which is 7.5% higher than the previous year.

•    It has gone up even further to Rs 1192.11 crore in the year 2012-13, which is 21% higher than the last year

•    For the year 2013-14, the revenue earning has been Rs 993.68 crore till the month of December, which is 17.5% higher than the amount earned till the same period of the previous year.