Kerala will send a delegation to the Centre to ensure that the State is not disadvantaged by the proposed motor vehicles Act, Transport Minister Thomas Chandy told the Assembly here on Tuesday.
He was participating in the question hour. When the Bill is presented in the Rajya Sabha, the government will work with the Opposition to see to it that clauses detrimental to the State are not passed.
Computerised vehicle testing centres will be made compulsory from October 1, 2018. The clause in the proposed act that vehicle dealers can directly register vehicles will enable them to fool vehicle buyers. The act is aimed at pleasing corporates, the Minister said.
He said the government would consider a proposal to make compulsory the clear mention of fare stages in tickets for private buses. At present, passengers could not make out the fare stage.
The government would set up 44 ‘kera gramams” across the State, Agriculture Minister V.S. Sunil Kumar told the Assembly. The project aimed at promoting the planting of quality coconut palms. An area of 250 hectares would be considered as one unit for the project. Along with this scientific crop protection would be ensured. This way, the shortage in coconut production could be arrested. A sum of ₹33 crore had been set aside for this.
At present, there is a shortage of dwarf varieties of coconut. To counter this, the KAU has been asked to produce more saplings. The production of coconut has gone down by 1.25% due to pest infestation.
In 2015-16, the acerage of coconut farming came down to 7,90,223 hectares. The use of coconut groves for construction purposes was also a setback. The KAU had not developed a practical method to counter “kaattuveezhcha” in coconut palms. Many methods were in vogue across the State, but the KAU had not yet validated those methods.
It had been estimated that the State had lost 36,891,22 hectares of paddy due to severe drought. The availability of water for farming plummeted due to a fall in the levels of water in traditional sources, in reservoirs, and other sources.
The shortage of rain has increased the acidity of the soil which, in turn, affected farming adversely. Funds had been sanctioned to mix ‘kummayam’ in the soil to counter this. A project worth ₹57 crore would be set up at Sulthan Bathery to counter the effects of drought.
In a reply to C. Divakaran, Minister P. Thilothaman said the distribution of ration cards would be over by the end of May.
