Chandigarh, March 12: Haryana Chief Minister, Sh. Manohar Lal said that the Budget for 2021-22 has been prepared amid the unprecedented global crisis induced by the COVID-19 Pandemic and challenges being faced as never before. However, under the dynamic leadership of Prime Minister, Sh. Narendra Modi, our country is able to mitigate the crisis.
The Chief Minister who also holds the portfolio of Finance Minister said this while presenting the State Budget for the year 2021-22 during the ongoing Vidhan Sabha Session held here today.
“Health of our people has been accorded top priority by the State Government and reiterating the same an amount of Rs. 7,731 crores have been allocated in BE 2021-22, which is an increase of 20.2 per cent over the RE 2020-21 outlay of Rs. 6,433 crores.
While divulging more details, Sh. Manohar Lal stated that the above said Budget allocation includes Rs. 4,606 crores for health and family welfare, Rs. 2,136 crores for medical education and research, Rs. 315 crores for Ayush, Rs. 238 crores for employees state insurance 36 health care, Rs. 42 crores for food and drugs administration and Rs. 394 crores for sports.
“In these challenging times and the government has ensured availability, accessibility and affordability of Healthcare services for all. Besides ensuring extensive testing throughout the state, that too at affordable prices, the State boosts of recovery rate of around 98 percent with a significantly low 1.11 per cent fatality rate due to Corona,” informed the Chief Minister.
He said that the State Government had constituted Haryana Corona Relief Fund with the objectives, inter-alia, to accept donations from public to provide immediate financial and medical assistance and other relief packages to persons adversely affected by COVID-19 Pandemic in the State. Besides this Haryana has also performed considerably well in containing the spread of coronavirus by providing efficient health service delivery to the infected people and speedy delivery of relief packages such as food, cash and other basic goods and services to the vulnerable sections of the society, he informed.
“To strengthen the Health Infrastructure of the State, the bed strength in various health institutions was increased by about 3000 in the last five years. Now to meet the growing demand for hospital beds, the government has decided to increase the bed capacity of all civil hospitals to 200 from their existing bed capacity,” said the Chief Minister.
956 regular doctors and 206 Ayush medical officers recruited during Pandemic
The Chief Minister said that while combating the pandemic Government recruited 956 regular doctors and 206 Ayush medical officers. Now, new posts of 350 medical officers and 60 dental surgeons would be created during this financial year to provide additional health professionals.
Extensive Sampling being done
The Chief Minister informed that extensive Sampling through RTPCR and Rapid Antigen Testing Kits are being done in all Districts of Haryana. More than 58 lakh samples have been collected so far. To ensure proper treatment of COVID Patients, we took the initiative and established Plasma banks at Faridabad, Gurugram, Panchkula, Rohtak and Karnal wherein 4856 number of Plasma Units have been collected from COVID 19 recovered patients till date and 3291 patients have been administered Plasma therapy treatment.
Haryana received 2,41,500 doses of Covishield and 20,000 doses of Covaxin
The Chief Minister informed that the State has been authorized to use two Covid-19 vaccines for emergency use such as Covishield of Serum Institute of India and Covaxin of Bharat Bio-tech and received 2,41,500 doses of Covishield and 20,000 doses of Covaxin in the first supply on January 13, 2021. State have sufficient cold chain space to store COVID-19 vaccines.
An amount of Rs. 9.10 crores has been sanctioned to DCs
The Chief Minister informed that an amount of Rs. 9.10 crores has been sanctioned to various Deputy Commissioners of the State for taking appropriate measures for containment of COVID-19 pandemic at local level. Apart from this, an amount of Rs. 131.85 crores has also been provided from the State Disaster Response Fund to the Departments of Medical Education and Research (Rs. 43.59 crores), Urban Local Bodies (Rs. 7.01 crores), Home (Rs. 4.29 Crores) and Health and Family Welfare (Rs. 76.96 Crores) for addressing various issues that arose in the wake of COVID-19 Pandemic, he said.
During COVID-19 pandemic, the Government has provided financial assistance to 17 lakh families including Mukhya Mantri Parivar Samridhi Yojana, BPL families, construction workers and workers in the unorganized sector. Under the operation ‘Samvedna’ 4.44 lakh migrant workers were sent to their native States through 100 special Shramik trains and 6,629 buses with expenditure Rs. 8.21 crores.
‘Distress Ration Token Scheme’
The Chief Minister said that Haryana invested in the implementation of ‘Distress Ration Token Scheme’ which was later adopted across the country under the Aatmnirbhar Bharat initiative. It envisaged distributing 5 kg wheat and 1 kg pulse per family to persons having no ration cards and to financially distressed families. Under the scheme 5.63 lakh families were identified for distribution of free ration.
Various initiatives taken-up during COVID-19 through Anganwadi workers at village level
The Chief Minister informed that various initiatives were taken-up by the Government during COVID-19 through Anganwadi workers at village level who are designated as front line workers. 10 lakh face masks were prepared and distributed free of cost among the masses along with sanitary napkins and diapers to the migrants across all districts. Information on social distancing along with knowledge on preventive measures to prevent COVID-19 Pandemic like hand washing, use of sanitizers and face covering, hygiene, information on not touching hand, mouth, nose, etc., was also imparted. Dry ration and dry milk are being provided at doorstep of all beneficiaries by the Anganwadi workers during this Pandemic.