Jaipur (Rajasthan): Forty sarpanchs from different districts of Jammu and Kashmir who left for a five-day training-cum-exposure tour to Rajasthan, reached Model Gram Panchayat Piplantri on the second day of their training.
Here Padmashree Shyam Sundar Paliwal informed them about the Panchayati Raj system along with the local environment.
They were made aware of various government schemes and informed about the local land, water, tress and how to put in use the government schemes in order to become self-sufficient.
The sarpanchs also took stock of watersheds, environment based employment, NREGA works and water management works and participated in the quorum of the panchayat.
Earlier, Secretary, JK Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, Sheetal Nanda flagged off the tour from the Panchayat Bhawan here, urging the sarpanchs to take maximum advantage of the field exposure so that the best practices learnt gets replicated in various panchayats of the Union Territory.
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"The purpose of the visit is to expose them to the best practices, to make them interact with the beacon leaders and learn about the implementation of the flagship schemes in Rajasthan," she said.
Nanda said it is the vision of the administration 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," she said.
Director panchayats, J-K, Rakesh Sarangal said this would now be a continuous practice with regular batches visiting various states at regular intervals.
"The Department in January, February and December 2020, sent sarpanch from J-K to Pune and Uttrakhand for field exposure tours," he said.
During the visit, the sarpanchs would be exposed to various activities being carried out, including the Solid-Liquid Waste Management, generation of own-source revenue, preparation of budget, integration of labour budget under MGNREGA with GPDP and SDGs and Integration of Panchayat Development plans at various tiers, he said.