The State Level Screening Committee on Border Area Development Programme (BADP) headed by Chief Secretary, B B Vyas today held a comprehensive review of the implementation of the programme in the State.Principal Secretary, H&ME, Principal Secretary to Chief Minister, Commissioner/Secretary, PW (R&B), Divisional Commissioner, Jammu, Divisional Commissioner, Kashmir, Commissioner/ Secretary, Science &Technology, Secretary Education and other senior officers of Army/Para military/BRO were present. The DCs of 11 border districts participated in the meeting via video conferencing.The Committee finalized the list of schemes for implementation under BADP- 2017-18 and approved the overall Annual Action Plan (AAP) of Rs 162 Cr for the year 2017-18 including Rs 103 Cr AAP of 11 border districts, Rs 25 Cr AAP of the departments of Health, H&UD, PW(R&B) and PHE& I& FC, Rs 17 Cr of Border Guarding Forces (BGF) and Rs 16 Cr AAP for Development of 27 ongoing and 14 new Model Villages.The Committee also reviewed the progress of BADP works undertaken during 2016-17.BADP is a 100% centrally funded programme and covers villages located close to the border. The main objective is to meet the special development needs of the people in border areas and to provide essential infrastructure through convergence of Central/State and BADP schemes.
The programme is under implementation in 11 border districts of Jammu, Samba, Kathua, Rajouri, Poonch, Kupwara, Baramulla, Bandipora, Shopian, Leh and Kargil.Chief Secretary received brief from DCs regarding ongoing and completed works under BADP with directions to ensure that projects taken up under BADP are phased in a manner, so as to ensure their completion within 2-3 years. He underscored the need to focus on convergence and dovetailing of BADP with other schemes to create productive assets in the border villages for the benefit of the people.Chief Secretary also urged special focus on all border schools under BADP and augmenting their drinking water, toilet and sports facilities besides taking up fencing works in schools and introducing programmes of skill development for the youth.Chief Secretary said that inspection, verification of schemes and 3rd party monitoring should continue under BADP and all DCs should carry out impact analysis utilizing services of District Statistics & Evaluation Officers/ Academic Institutions and bring out a paper on how BADP has helped the border areas in terms of desired coverage and socio-developmental outcomes.Detailed deliberations were also held on framing up a convergence model of various schemes & BADP that could facilitate dovetailing of financial resources for taking up construction of individual and community bunkers along the border districts affected by frequent cross border shelling/firing. Divisional Commissioner, Jammu was asked to work out a suitable proposal in this regard.