New Delhi [India]: The Indian government is not leaving any stone unturned to put people first. From upgrading the farm sector to bringing in the digital revolution, it is touching upon every aspect of life. It is creating more opportunities for the youngsters.
The young generation of India is the country’s future leader and nation builder. With this thinking, special emphasis has been given to various aspects of education in the general budget. These include access to quality education for all and the promotion of institutions to high international standards.
India’s thinking is to overhaul the education system by having a modern pedagogy system in the current decade, for which many announcements have been made in the general budget. Efforts have been made to provide better education to the poor, Dalit, backward, and tribal, with special emphasis on rural India through steps like e-vidya, one class-one channel, digital laboratories, and digital universities.
National Digital University is a noble and astute step in India’s educational system. The lack of seats in universities has been a stumbling block. But this initiative will revolutionise academia by preparing the youth for the current and future learning needs and re-learning through a world-class digital university. Because of the importance of teaching in the mother tongue, medical and technical education in the local language has begun in many states.
In the budget, announcements were made to establish a Digital Ecosystem for Skilling and Livelihood (DESH STACK) e-portal and e-skilling laboratory to equip the youth with skills appropriate for the post-COVID situation and to realise the goal of a self-sufficient India.
This initiative will benefit tourism, drones, animation cartoons, and defence products. In a meeting with education stakeholders, Prime Minister Narendra Modi emphasised the importance of collaboration in providing high-quality education in rural areas and promoting new ideas.
Emphasising the betterment of the farming condition of the country, Prime Minister Narendra Modi stated, “We also need to increase this awareness among the farmers so that they should get the soil of their fields tested every one or two years. They will get scientific knowledge regarding the use of pesticides and fertilisers for different crops. You must be aware that our young scientists have developed nano fertiliser. This is going to be a game-changer. Our corporate world has a lot of potential in this field too.”
Increasing farmers’ income, lowering farming costs, and providing farmers with modern facilities from seed to market are among the current central government’s priorities. In the last seven years, many new steps have been taken to boost agriculture in the country. The agriculture budget has increased several times in just six years, and agricultural loans to farmers have increased 2.5 times in seven years. During COVID’s difficult times, three crore small farmers were given Kisan Credit Cards (KCC) through a special campaign.
The SVAMITVA scheme related to land metering, digitisation of land records, and UID PIN aims to promote the progress of the villages. A target of 80 lakh new houses has been set in this budget to ensure that every family has its own pucca house. Houses using new technology, such as lighthouses, are being built in six cities across the country. A target of approximately four crore new connections has been set in this budget under the Jal Jeevan Mission.
Calling broadband in villages the need of the day, the Prime Minister said that this would boost digital connectivity and create a huge workforce of skilled youth. With this, a beginning has been made to bring all the post offices into the core banking system so that the Jan Dhan Yojana started for financial inclusion can be reached 100 per cent of the population.
Financial inclusion has made it possible to make women partners in economic activities. The central government’s initiative is to encourage the setting up of more and more startups in rural areas, in which the role of the private sector is important.
The Prime Minister told all the stakeholders that Krishi Vigyan Kendras and Agricultural Universities would have to mobilise with full force to take the benefits of natural farming to the people. He asked Kisan Vikas Kendras to adopt one village each.
He also urged universities to target introducing 100 or 500 farmers towards natural farming within the next year. He said that another trend is visible nowadays in our middle and upper-middle-class families. It is often seen that as many as 221 things have reached their dining table.
Many protein and calcium products are now on their dining tables. Many such products are from abroad, and they are not even according to Indian taste. All these products are available here that our farmers produce but could not present in the right way and market them. Therefore, an attempt should be made to prioritise ‘Vocal for Local’ in it as well.
Adapting to the new era, the government is working on promoting soil testing every year and establishing a network of laboratories for this. (ANI)
