BHUBANESWAR: Coming under ire of smart city residents, the state government on Monday decided to pause collection of revised rate of holding tax, till.
Police appeal to people to follow Covid norms in Bhubaneswar
BHUBANESWAR: It was not a case of routine monitoring of garbage collection, fixing defunct street lights, removing clogs from drains and solving waterlogging. The city civic body was facing an unlikely and uphill task tackling a pandemic.
Before March first week, things looked fine at Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC). It all changed once the government came out with Covid regulations on March 13.
Led by commissioner Prem Chandra Chaudhury, the BMC, however, rose to the occasion. It appointed a nodal officer, Suvendu Sahu, an Odisha Administrative Service (OAS) officer, to work 24x7 and coordinate with all concerned to meet a crisis that no one had ever faced. In the initial days, the BMC fought hard to trace the contacts who had come in touch with a positive person. Surya Nagar became the first containment zone and the BMC struggled to supply essential commodities to people on time, drawing criticism. But as da
Chief minister Naveen Patnaik
BHUBANESWAR: Setting a target of zero infection, chief minister Naveen Patnaik on Sunday urged people to follow Covid guidelines rigorously to achieve the goal and to avoid another lockdown, especially in view of the recent surge in cases in different states.
“With your cooperation, the pandemic situation is under control in Odisha. The World Health Organization (WHO) has lauded our initiative in containing the spread of virus.,” he said
“There should not be any complacency even though daily infection rate is below 100 at present. The pandemic is not over yet,” Naveen said in a video message. It comes on the eve of Odisha detecting its first Covid case a year back. Stating that the pandemic situation in Maharashtra, Punjab, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh has worsened and part of Maharashtra is under lockdown, Naveen said normalcy has returned to Odisha because of the sacrifices and cooperation of the people.
BHUBANESWAR: Success of operation Silent Viper, which had led to the arrest of 1999 Baranga gang-rape case’s main accused Bibekananda Biswal last month, buoyed the commissionerate police to arrest fugitive Bikram Aditya Jena, an accused in the 2008 murder of famous music director Sumant Mohanty. Negligence by Mancheswar police over a decade had helped Bikram to evade arrest.
The special squad’s assistant commissioner of police Sanjeev Satpathy and his team received specific input about Bikram hiding in Bhubaneswar for the last few days. Bikram, who did diploma in computer engineering in Hyderabad, had fled to Pune after allegedly committing the ghastly crime on October 9, 2008. The case’s prime accused Manas Ranjan Vedanta and three others Sushil Samantray, Sushil Jena and Subhakant Jena were arrested on October 11, 2008 and are currently on bail.
At present, only 3,500 electric vehicles are plying in the state
BHUBANESWAR: The state government has proposed to offer attractive incentives to buyers of electric vehicles. According to the draft Electric Vehicle (EV) policy notified last month, the buyers are likely to get a 15% subsidy on purchase of electric vehicles.
Two-wheeler buyers would get a maximum of Rs 5,000 subsidy, while it would be Rs 12,000 for three-wheelers and Rs 1 lakh for four-wheelers. “Government employees would get 100% interest free loan to purchase electric vehicles,” the draft policy notification stated.
The draft policy has proposed that government departments and offices and public sector undertakings should give preference to hire battery-operated vehicles for official use. Municipal authorities will provide subsidized parking for all personal EVs. “Towns and cities will prepare city parking plans to encourage provisions for on-street parking spaces for EVs with subsidized fee and charging