Secretary, Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (RD&PR), Sheetal Nanda today released a booklet titled “Initiatives and Achievements 2019-20”- containing report card on last one year progress of the RDD in Jammu division, here at Panchyat Bhawan.Director Rural Development Department (RRD) Jammu, Sudershan Kumar was also present on the occasion.While lauding the efforts of the Directorate for compilation of the booklet, Sheetal Nanda said that the booklet shall provide a window to the stakeholders to watch out for change taking place in the rural landscape of the Jammu Division.Sheetal Nanda said that the department is implementing various centrally sponsored and state sector schemes like MGNREGA, PMAY (Gramin), 14th FC Award, RGSA, CD and Panchayats etc adding that all 148 blocks of the Division have got their Block Development Council Chairpersons.Secretary RDD&PR said that it is imperative to showcase the achievements made at the ground level which will provide an insight about the socio-economic condition of the rural masses.Earlier, the Director Rural Development, Jammu Sudershan Kumar, in his welcome address appreciated efforts put forth by the team involved in bringing out this booklet.Sudershan said the word “initiatives” has its own significance with respect to the Directorate of Rural Development one of the most significant one is constitution of Block Development Councils in the Division. He further informed that under PMAY (Gramin) houseless and poor families are provided financial assistance and a total of 15417 PMAY houses have been completed since the inception of the scheme.The achievements of the department have been well recognized at the national level too.
The Jammu division bagged five National Awards for the year 2019-20 which include three for effective implementation of MGNREGA scheme and two national Panchayat awards. The child friendly Gram Panchayat award 2020 and Nanaji Deshmukh Rashtriya Gaurav Gram Sabha Puraskar 2020.Among others present were Joint Director Rural Development (Administration), Mohammad Anwar Banday; Deputy Director (Planning), Gurneet Kour, Assistant Commissioner Development, Amit Varmani; Executive Engineer, REW, Jammu Ram Singh, besides other officers and officials of the concerned department were also present.