RAYAGADA DISTRICT SELECTED FOR 'PAPERLESS OFFICE' PILOT PROJECT

Rayagada district has been selected for the pilot project for 'Paperless Office'. This is another feather in the cap of the district administration in matters of e-governance, after Implementation of the Biometric based Targeted PDS project in the district. The district has attained a reputation for being selected as a pilot district for a number of programs, even for those not linked to e-governance.

Aa apart of this initiative, a team from Bhubaneshwar, visited the district and in the presence of Collector Rayagada, conducted a meeting with the Deputy Collectors and dealing assistants of different sections of Collectorate, explaining them the concept of Paperless Office and the necessary changes that would be required to make this program a success.

The concept of Paperless Office involves conduci=ting the business of a particular office with the help of computers. Entire file work, including the note part and the correspondence part are done on the computer. Its basically the same system, which instead of doing on paper, is done on a computer.

Collector Rayagada informed that the district had taken several e-governance initiatives on its own, such as the file and letter tracking system and now this project seemed to be a god sent and that the district is fully prepared to implement this project, now that the support from the state is coming.

The team from Bhubaneshwar will assess the requirement of the Collectorate by studying all the sections for seven days and then working out a required plan for that.

CIVIC ACTION PROGRAM CRPF 4TH BN, RAYAGADA

SUSPENSION BRIDGE IN RAYAGADA OPEN FOR PUBLIC

The much awaited opening ceremony of the foot suspension bridge in Rayagada was organized on 26th March 2012. The bridge has become a centre of attraction for the people of Rayagada and daily thousands of visitors flock to this place in the evening to enjoy the marvel of engineering in their district.

The bridge was formally dedicated to the people by Sri. Girish Bharadwaj, the bridge man of India. He has built more than 100 such bridges in South India, especially in his home state of Karnataka. He is the inspiration behind this bridge and has shared his technical expertise for this bridge free of cost.

Sri Bharadwaj, runs the Bharat Grama Sethu Pratishthana, a trust which believes in the using engineering skills for social causes. It aims at providing rural connectivity n a cost effective nad innovative way through foot suspension bridges. This trust has shown a new system of execution of public works, within and also outside the government system. Mr. Bharadwaj calls this need based connectivity.

Suspension bridges rarely figure in the government scheme of things. If at all it is only in the mega structure level. In the state of Orissa though, there exists a suspension bridge in Dhabaleshwar in the Cuttack district, suspension bridges are not in the schedule of the Works dept. This makes the achievement of the district IAP team a special one, as they achieved a feat of which there was no precedent in the state, as the earlier bridge was designed and executed by a Kolkata based agency.

Collector Rayagada said that though the district IAP team had decided for a suspension bridge over the river Nagavalli at the place called Chekaguda, it struggled for months together to find execution support and in thisphase all they could get was discouragement, as no dept was willing ot risk a project of which they had no experience. The district administration was left in lurch and but did not give up, as it very well knew the importance of this connectivity, that it was to connect 200 villages to the district HQ. When there was very little hope left, light came in form of Mr. Girish Bhartadwaj, who willing took the challenge, when most declined.

The cooperation of the Police Housing board, especially its MD. Sri. Sudhanshu Sarangi, IPS is also valuable, as they helped in floating the tender, when no dept came forward.

The most valuable of all is the spirit and enthusiasm of two young entrepreneurs of Rayagada. Sri. Ravi Prasad Dora and Sri. Narin Kumandan. their participation in this project was to be the most critical part. These two gentleman who the Collector and SP call as them the part of the 'dream team' took up the most important challenge, that of execution of the project.

This project will act as a prototype for such connectivity in other districts of the state and its a great joy to dedicate this to the people of the district Collector Rayagada said.

BAN ON MOVEMENT OF FOREIGN NATIONALS IN RAYAGADA PVTG AREAS

The district administration in its letter to all tour operators has said that in the light of the recent unfortunate events of abduction of foreign nationals in the state and after having taken all the factors relating to the security of foreign nationals into consideration, the district administration consciously decides to stop all movement of foreign nationals and tourists in the district's PVTG areas for an indefinite period of time. It further says that the district administration needs to reassess the security situation and that it will take a call on this issue of regulating the movement of foreign nationals and tourists in the district either way. Till that time no permission will be issued to foreign nationals and tourists to visit any part of the district.

This move is likely to hurt the tourism industry in the state, which is already in trouble because of the recent introduction of ban on photography in the PVTG areas of the state. There has been reaction from the tourism industry about this photography ban and a demand for relaxation of norms especially relating to photography as tourist are bound to carry camera to preserve the memories of their visits, say tourism experts.

The district administration however informed that this is a temporary measure and that the security of the foreign guests and other tourists is of paramount importance and any inconvenience that will be caused by this decision of the district administration is a small price to pay, than what could otherwise happen. It has also promised to get back the tourism activity on track as soon as possible in the district.

WORLD TB DAY IN RAYAGADA

MLA LAXMIPUR KIDNAPPED BY MAOISTS

As if it wasn’t enough for the state govt in the recent kidnapping of the Italian tourists by the naxals, another incident within a weeks time happened in the Koraput district of Odisha, in which a sitting popular MLA was abducted by armed naxals near Toyaput, near Laxmipur in Koraput district.
Mr. Jhina Hikaka, a young and popular MLA, representing the Laxmipur constituency in the Koraput district was elected on a BJD ticket in 2009. He was a govt servant before joining politics and had worked as an extension officer in the Laxmipur Block of Koraput district. He happens to be on eof the youngest MLAs in Odisha, just in his thirties.
These series of abductions in period of a week has raised questions about the over all handling of the naxal problem by the state government and an environment of fear seems to have been cast in the locality.
Laxmipur which is just 45 kms away from Rayagada district HQ is closely linked to this district and just before the 2008 delimitation a major part of Rayagada district was coming in the Laxmipur constituency.
There is lot of resentment in the locality because of this abduction of a popular leader and massive spontaneous protests are seen all over. Politicians, intellectuals and member so f the civil society, including journalists are planning massive protests against this action of maoists and demanding the safe an early release of all the hostages, including the italian nationals in Kandhamal.

DISTRICT LEVEL ASHA CONVENTION RAYAGDA

District level ASHA convention was held today in Ashok Mandap in Rayagada tgoday. The convention was inaugurated by Collector Rayagada.
Acreidted Social Health Activist (ASHA) is recent addition in the Health administration at the grass root level. This is a level below the ANM and the work is very similar to Health Worker. The difference is only that of the area. The Health worker is posted at the sub centre level and has a cluster of villages as his area of work. The ASHA worker has an individual village as her area of work, which is similar to the anganwadi Worker in terms of area and status. There 1827 ASHA workers in Rayagada district.
ASHA workers have a very important role to play in the implentation of different schmes and programmes of the health dept. Besides they play a vital role in keeping an eye over the overall health situation in tier espective areas, particullarly during the outbreak of epidemics and also play a crucial role in mamagement of epidemic situation and special programs such as mass immunization.
In today's function, Collector Rayagada felicitated 11 ASHA workers for meritorius service. He told that they are the eyes and ears of the health dept and being from the local community they enjoy the trust of the local people and hence the district administration has very high hopes from them and that they will surely live upto the expectations as they have done in the paSt.

PROTEST AGAINST THE ABDUCTION OF ITALIAN TOURISTS BY NAXALS

Rayagada civil scoiety today carried a peace march in protest of the recent qbduction of two Italian nationals. The rally started from the Ambedkar chowk in the heart of Rayagada town and culminated in the Jagannath Mandir.
About a thousand persons from all walks of life had joined the rally demanding the early release of the kidnapped tourists. They grossly condemned the abduction act of the Left wing Extremists which has tarnished the image of not only the state,but also the entire country. They also said that there is no reason why some forign nationals whi have nothing tp do with the politics of the country be made to suffer like this.
Jayaram Jena of the Seva Samaj, a social orgnization who organized the members and intellectuals of Rayagada of the civil society for the rally said that their organization believes in Gandhian principles and they condemn such violent abduction of forign nationals and appealed to the public sirited citizens to come forward to condemn such acys and demand the early and safe release of the tourists.

ASSOCIATED PRESS COVERING THE BIOMETRIC BASED TPDS PROJECT

A team from the Associated Press, an American news agency popularly known as AP, is in Rayagada to cover the Biometric based Targeted Public Distribution System. The team headed by its South Asia Bureau chief, Mr. Ravi Nessman and photgraphers Mr. Shonal Ganguly and Mr. Manish visited different fair price shops in the Rayagada town and the rural areas and filmed the functioning of the BTPDS.

The Biometric based targeted Public Distribution System is implemented in different ways in Urban and Rural areas in the Rayagada district, which is the pilot district for this project.

In Urban areas ( Rayagada town as of now) it is smart card based and the transaction is done with the help of Biometric enabled Point of Sale (PoS) device. The transaction gets over in matter of seconds and a fool proof public distribution is ensured.In rural areas however because of practical difficulties, a system of bar coded cards and coupons is in place. The former system is undoubtedly much more superior and easy to use than the latter, but given the issues with electricity and other infrastructure, it was felt wise to limit the former system to Rayagada Municipality area and gradually extend it to other areas.

The team will stay in Rayagada and cover various dimensions of this project and its impact in the matter of providing food security to the people in this areas.

SUB COLLECTOR RAYAGADA UNEARTHS MAJOR FAKE ID RACKET

Pramod Mishra, Sub Collector Rayagada has unearthed a major fake identity cards racket in Rayagada town today.

The sequence of events is as follows:

A beneficiary of a social welfare scheme had filed an application in the office of Sub Collector Rayagada. There was a requirement of identity card and what was produced by the applicant led to unearthing of big fake identity card racket. The applicant produced an identity a  Electoral Photo Identity Cards (EPIC) which was manipulated with a photo editing software. The card looked fake at the face of it. The Sub Collector Rayagada very cleverly got the details of the place and persons from where the applicant obtained the card and the revelations led to the chain of persons invovled in this, which finally led to a photo studio in front of the State Bank of India, Rayagada branch.

Sub Collector Rayagada along with Durga Charan Mahapatra, Tahsildar Rayagada and force from the local police station led by Parul Gupta, IPS ( UT) and IIC town police station, raided the photo studio and what came out of the bag was a very big and systematic set up of forging ID cards, including the EPIC cards and even that of Police and other security establishments.

There were 4 computers that were put to use for forging the IDs and hundreds of fake ID cards, majority of them being EPIC cards. The most disturbing finding was that there were fake cards of Police dept and other security agencies like CISF, CRPF and like, which can be a big national security issue in a naxal affected district like Rayagada. The four computers that were found in the premisis were loaded with apparently thousands of  soft copies of such fake cards. Besides a register was found in which entries of the fake cards 'issued' by the photo studio were noted down.

The photo studio owner is said be in Berhampur now and police authorities are tracing him down. Collector Rayagada, Dr. Nitin.B. Jawale visited the spot and appreciated the worj done by the Sub Collector and Police authorities. talking to media persons he said that strongest possible case will be made against these counterfeiters and even provisions related to national security will be invoked against these offenders

NADRS TRAINING OF VETERINARY DOCTORS & STAFF OF RAYAGADA DIST.

ENGINEERING & EMOTIONS MAKE AN IMPOSSIBLE BRIDGE DREAM COME TRUE

BRAND NEW STATE OF THE ART SUSPENSION BRIDGE, CHEKAGUDA, RAYAGADA, ODISHA

Rayagada district, which was a part of undivided and in the KBK zone of Orissa, is dominated by tribal communities residing in the hilly and extremely difficult terrain which dominates the landscape of the district. Most of the habitations are located in the valleys of the mountainous sections of the Eastern ghats, which makes these parts one of the most inaccessible in the country. Lot has been done in previous years to provide connectivity to such areas, but still a lot remains to be done.
The district administration during the last outbreak of epidemic diarrhea encountered lot of problems in negotiating the numerous rivulets to reach villages with diarrhea cases.


THE DISTRICT ADMINISTRATION IDENTIFIED SUCH RIVULETS FOR RURAL CONNECTIVITY


At that point itself the idea of having low cost connectivity which can be provided in a shorter span of time was mooted. Fortunately just after that Govt of India came up with the scheme of Integrated Action Plan for the Left Wing Extremism (LWE) districts, in which a district level committee consisting if the Collector, Superintendent of Police and the DFO, is being provided funds to indentify and fill up critical developmental gaps in the naxal affected districts. The district committee wasted no time in finalizing the type of connectivity projects. Since the interior areas of the district are such that a large number of sparsely populated habitations are scattered on either sides of the rivulets with fast flowing water, it was neither feasible nor economical to plan a regular bridge or even a culvert in all locations which required connectivity. The need was that of something that would not be required to be constructed in the fast flowing waters and would also be economical and fastly built. After deliberating over a number of designs, the concept of prefabricated bridges was unanimously decided to be ideal for the disrict as it is economical and time saving.
The first place where such bridge as to be built was identified ata pplace on the Nagavalli reiver, connecting 9 GPs on the other side of the river to the district Headquarter. For this place a foot suspension bridge was planned. The biggest challenge however was to find an executing agency, as there is only one suspension bridge in the state of Orissa at Dhabaleshwar, in Cuttack district, which was built by the Works dept of Government of Odisha in 2004. There was no precedent of this kind of a bridge being built by the district administration in the state of Odisha, at least.


THE OLD BAMBOO BRIDGE BUILT BY THE VILLAGERS THEMSELVES

After two months of frantic search for support for execution, all that the district administration got was discouragement for what was certified by many as an over ambitious project of an unrealistic trio of officers. Luck showered it blessings by the way of a contact given Mr. Hegde, a CRPF officer posted in Rayagada. The contact was that of ‘Girish Bhardwaj’, an engineer who has built more than 100 suspension bridges in South India, particularly in his home state of Karnataka. Collector Rayagada spoke to Mr. Bhardwaj and explained about the plan of rural connectivity for the district. Collector Rayagada told that. he had very little hope about a positive response from Mr. Bharadwaj, given his great reputation and the fact that he had as many as 10 bridge projects in hand at that moment. One fine day SP Rayagada informed that Mr. Bharadwaj has expressed his willingness to come to Rayagada and that upon seeing the site and discussion with the district administration, he will decide about the project.
On arrival to Rayagada Mr. Girish Bharadwaj was shown the site and was explained about the vision behind this project. He on his part gave a presentation about the bridges which he had built, (the number nearing 100) and informed that he has dedicated his life for providing rural connectivity to rural areas through his organization, Bharat Grama Sethu Pratisthana. It was a marriage of visions and as Collector Rayagada puts it, ' it seemed like a divine intervention'.
The district administration also intended to build capacity within the district, so that many such projects in the future could be executed by the executants within the district and hence two young entrepreneurs from Rayagada, Sri. Ravi Prasad Dora and Sri. Narin Kumandan, were persuaded by the district administration, especially SP Rayagada to participate in the execution of the project. The enthusiasm and dedication shown by these two young people was to prove to be the most crucial factor in the successful completion of the project, other than the sharing of the technology and execution support by Sri. Girish Bharadwaj.

The work was assigned to the Police Housing corporation by the district administration, which worked out the project cost to 1.19 crore for the 152 meter long foot suspension bridge in the early 2011.Even though the work was entrusted to Orissa Police Housing Corporation, with the aim of expediting the work, it took more than 3 months to just float the tender and further 3 to 4 months to allot the work order. Only in the end of November the formalities could be completed and ground breaking for the work was done on 8th December 2011.
After the ground breaking the work of fabrication of the metal components of the bridge was also taken simultaneously. The skilled workers of Mr. Bharadwaj, who have an experience of more than 100 bridges with them, worked overtime to bring to the bridge to its completion within a period of three months. The pictographical depiction is given in the slide show below.



The vision of the district administration, as said earlier is to make many such bridges, at a low cost and in a shorter span of time. With the completion of this bridge, the district administration has not only got the necessary confidence and motivation, but also the necessary capacity to take up such work in the interior areas.

This project is not only a story of the execution of an engineering marvel, but also one in which the determination of the district administration was tested to its limit. This is a befitting redemption of the trust reposed by the government on its premier services and also an example to show that when the govt reposes its trust in its services and gives the necessary freedom and flexibility with the funds, it can work out wonders.