Chhattisgarh Government announces DA.

   Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh has announced 7 per cent increase in the dearness allowance for its nearly 2,00,000 employees, new pay scales for panchayat teachers, four per cent subsidy on bank interest to farmers, sitting allowance to panchayat representatives and plots to MPs and MLAs in the new capital city.

   Dr Singh announced these sops while winding up the debate on the appropriation bill for Rs 39,677 crore for 2012-13 which was passed by voice vote in the state Assembly last evening. The decision to increase the DA by 7 per cent of basic pay with effect from April 1 and another installment of DA in July, will entail an additional burden of Rs 300 crore to the state exchequer and end disparity between the DA of central and state government employees in the next fiscal. Besides, the Chief Minister announced new pay scales for panchayat teachers in the state with a 27 per cent salary hike for Grade-1, 18 per cent hike for Grade-2 and 16 per cent hike for Grade-3 teachers.

   This would put an additional burden of Rs 76 cr on the Government. He also declared 20 per cent increase in the wages of contractual workers from April. The Chief Minister, who has given maximum thrust on agriculture and allied sector in the 2012-13 budget to boost agricultural production, announced a 4 per cent subsidy to farmers on crop loans from nationalised banks, who now charge 7 per cent interest on crop loans to small and marginal farmers.

   The government will bear an additional burden of Rs 30 cr. Earlier, during his budget presentation, the Chief Minister had proposed reduction in the interest rate on crop loans from 3 per cent to 1 per cent on loans obtained by farmers from rural and cooperative banks. The Chief minister further hiked the honorarium of sarpanchs to Rs 500 per sitting to a maximum of Rs 2,000 per month. For the first time, the panchayat members in the state would get an honorarium of Rs 100 per sitting. In order to make the Members of Parliament from Chhattisgarh and state legislators happy, the Chief Minister announced his government's decision to provide plots to them in the new capital city now under construction at village Rakhi, about 20 km from here

Source : UNI

Revised Train Fares for Journey in AC-First Class, AC-2 Tier, Executive Class & First Class from Tomorrow.

   The Ministry of Railways has revised passenger fares with effect from tomorrow i.e. 1st April 2012 in AC-First Class, AC-2 tier, Executive Class and First Class only. There is no revision in other classes of travel. The revised fares in these classes would be applicable to all types of trains on Indian Railways network.

   The revised fares will also apply to tickets issued in advance for journeys to commence on or after 1st April 2012. In the case of tickets already issued at pre-revised rates, the difference in fares from 1st April 2012 will be recovered from passengers either by TTEs in the trains or by the booking offices before commencement of the journey by the passengers as per the usual practice in case of such fare revisions.

  The revised list of fares for the information of the public is being displayed at the stations and has been made available to the railway staff well in time. The revised passenger fare table is also available on the website of the Ministry of Railways i.e. indianrailways.gov.in

PIB

Portability in Saving Bank Accounts.

   Damodaran Committee was set up by Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on May 26, 2010 to look into banking services rendered to retail and small customers. The Committee submitted its report to RBI on July 04, 2011. The Committee has recommended that customer should be allowed to maintain the same account number in a bank even when he/she moves to another city or shifts his account to another branch in the same city. RBI has taken action on the recommendations submitted by the Damodaran Committee and in October, 2011 advised Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) for implementation of the above recommendation.

   RBI has also stated that provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and Rules do not support account portability between banks as records pertaining to identity of a client has to be maintained by the bank establishing relationship with the customer for a period of 10 years from the date of cessation of the transactions between the client and the bank.

   This information was given by the Minister of State for Finance, Shri Namo Narain Meena in written reply to a question in Lok Sabha today.

PIB