The adoption of a scheme to buy back plastic waste to be later used for road construction and successful implementation of the ban on polythene bags were his two initiatives that Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal highlighted at the two-day National Convention on Good Governance,called by BJP president Nitin Gadkari in Mumbai. Dhumal,accompanied by a team of ministers,said his governments drive to make Himachal a plastic-free state had started receiving massive public support. The government purchases plastic waste at the rate of Rs 3 per kilo gram and pays an additional Re 1 to the local bodies as handling charges. The waste is handed to the pubic works department for use in the road construction work, he said at the meeting on Saturday. Dhumal said environment protection was being accorded top priority,and mass awareness was being created by educating children through a nine-point environment code recited in the schools after morning prayers. The CM said the farming sector was also on the priority agenda and three ambitious schemes worth Rs 1,100 crore were under implementation. These include the Rs 353-crore subsidy scheme for polyhouses. He also highlighted the Rs 80-crore Atal Bijli Bachat Yojana under which four CFL bulbs have been distributed among 16.5 lakh domestic consumers. The scheme saved nearly 270 million units of power,valued at Rs 100 crore,in one year,Dhumal said. He said Rs 85-crore apple rejuvenation project was also being launched in the state to change the old pattern of apple plantation. To protect the crop from hailstorms,anti-hail guns were being set up on experimental basis,which would later be replicated at other places in a phased manner,the CM added.
