Jammu and Kashmir: Over 63000 people to attain self-employment under `Back to Village Programme`

Srinagar: The Jammu and Kashmir administration has planned to take up several initiatives during the 11-day public campaign under the `Chalo Gaon` and the `Back to Village Programme` phase IV.

The `Back to Village Programme` would provide self-employment to around 63 thousand people, identifying 100 tourist spots, allotment of land for projects worth Rs 6,248 crore, initiation of five industrial estates and transition to a ration card management system.

According to the officials, the government has assigned the responsibility to various departments for this.

The Finance Department has been asked to provide self-employment to at least 15 persons per panchayat of Jammu and Kashmir through the Entrepreneurship Development Institute (EDI) and Labor Department. With this, around 63,000 people will get employment in 4,200 panchayats of the union territory.

Banks will set up their own counters at the Panchayat level for the scrutiny of applications, approval and disposal of cases.

The Department of Tourism has been assigned the responsibility to identify at least five tourist spots, circuits and tracks within a district to be demarcated. Apart from this, it will also identify certain houses for homestay within the villages for the convenience of tourists.

As a major development, the Public Works Department will implement a 100 per cent online payment system with no manual intervention.

Principal Secretary of the Department of Higher Education, Rohit Kansal, who is also the head of the Back to Village Programme Committee, said in a tweet that a major public campaign will be launched under the Chalogao programme, where 35 departments will bring 85 people-oriented schemes to the people, eight 1,00,000 Ayushman cards, 2.5 lakh UDID cards, 2 lakh e-Sharm cards and 30,000 land passbooks will be distributed.