Secretary, Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, Sheetal Nanda today flagged off a batch of 40 Sarpanches of different districts from Union Territory of Jammu &Kashmir to Rajasthan on five days training cum exposure tour from Panchayat Bhawan here.Speaking on the occasion, Sheetal Nanda said that the purpose of the visit is to expose them to the best practices, to make them interact with the beacon leaders, learn about the implementation of the flagship schemes etc in the state of Rajasthan.Interacting with the Sarpanches, Secretary RDD asked them to take maximum advantage of the field exposure tour so that the best practices learnt gets replicated in various Panchayats of J&K UT.Sheetal Nanda further said that it is the vision of the Government of the UT to strengthen the Panchayati Raj system in the UT and to make the rural local bodies self reliant so that they take innovative initiatives and develop their Panchayats in all spheres not only in respect of physical infrastructure but also social and economic fields. This is one of many steps taken by the department in the direction.Speaking on the occasion, Director Panchayats, J&K, Rakesh Sarangal said that this shall now be a continuous practice with regular batches visiting various States at regular intervals. He also said that the Department in January, February and December 2020, sent Sarpanches from J&K to Pune and Uttrakhand for field exposure tours.Director Rural Development Jammu instructed Sarpanches to follow all Covid protocols during the visit. He asked them to learn the best practices from the PRIs of Rajasthan State as the Panchayati Raj system is well established there.During the visit, the Sarpanches shall be exposed to various activities being carried out including Solid Liquid Waste Management, generation of Own Source Revenue, Preparation of Budget, Integration of labour budget under MGNREGA with GPDP and SDGs, Integration of Panchayat Development plans at various tiers, Panchayat Enterprise Suit applications etc.