First of its kind project in India

Gujarat based Sewa bank, a powerful tool for the economic empowerment of self employed women, has now created history by initiating 50,000 poor women to go for micro pension scheme. The project first of its kind in India offers old age security through pension to self employed women working as labourers and vendor to eke out a living.

In country where billions are living below poverty line and only 11 percent of the organized sector have some kind of pension scheme, the number 50,000 may sound a pea nut. But the fact that in the last three years only 1.25 lakh have taken up micro pension shows the strength of these numbers which comes to 40 per cent of the total number in the country.

UTI is a partner in the project. It CMD U K Sinha, admits that the overall achievement was very embarrassing. Lack of awareness among people is the biggest reason for such a poor show of an excellent scheme, he said. Even among all states, the performance of Gujarat was the best because of the dedicated involvement of the bank and its MD Jayshree Vyas, he said.

Explaining the concept she said, “the program allows all women under 55 to save as little as Rs. 50 a month in a pension account. At age 58, participants in the program receive their savings with the accumulated interest to finance their retirement. Our program makes saving for retirement extremely simple.

Any interested applicant need only to open a savings account with SEWA Bank, and deposit enough money to finance their monthly pension deposit. SEWA Bank has set up a software program that automatically transfers money from the client’s savings account to their pension account every month.”

The money contributed by the pension account holders is invested in equity and debt instruments by professional team of the UTI which is a partner in the project. Ideally, it is 40 percent equity and 60 percent debt instruments. However, because of volatile market, the equity portion has remained 23 percent, according to Sinha of the UTI. The average of the three year is 11 percent plus interest.

Gujarat based GACL is poised to be the largest producer of Hydrogen Peroxide in the country

Gujarat Alkalies & Chemicals Limited (GACL) has taken up expansion of its hydrogen peroxide project at its Dahej Complex to increase the capacity by by 14000 TPA for an investment of Rs 98 crore.

After commissioning of expansion project, GACL is poised to be the largest producer of Hydrogen Peroxide in the country, according to company sources.

The company had commissioned its first hydrogen peroxide plant in 1996 at Baroda and second plant at Dahej in 2007. The total existing capacity of both plants is 25080 MTA which shall go up to 39080 MTA

Cost of solar in India will be lower than coal plants in five years

Ira Magaziner, chairman of Clinton Climate Initiative - a programme of the Willam J Clinton Foundation is hopeful that the cost of solar power generation in India will be lower than coal based plants in the next five years

CCI, which is in the process of setting up four Solar Parks across the world with an overall maximum capacity of 20,000 Mw today signed an MoU with Gujarat government on Monday for setting up in what is billed as world's largest solar project. Talking to Maulik Pathak, Magaziner shared his plans of tapping this sun-shine sector. Excerpts:

So you have finally firmed your plans on Gujarat after exploring for over a year now. Have you identified the location?
We have identified about three to four locations and will be finalising them in the next three to four weeks. About 5,000 hectares of land is required for the project.

We have been to many places where they talk and talk. Finally, we came to Gujarat where people act. CCI is aiming to set up solar park with a generation capacity of 3,000 Mw which could go up to 5,000 Mw. The cost of the project would be about $ 8-10 billion for 3,000 Mw and for 5,000 Mw it would be about $ 15 billion. The feasibility study will be over in 2010 and the plant will start in 2012.

How much solar capacities has Clinton Climate Initiative planned worldwide?
We are planning to set up four solar parks across the globe. We are looking at South Africa, California in US, Australia and Gujarat. All these projects are of the same size as of now. The overall capacity to be generated from solar in the four projects could go as high as 20,000 Mw.

From the progress made so far, we feel that the Gujarat project will be the first to come up. And this would be the world's largest solar project.

The cost of generation for solar power is very high as compared to other fossil fuel fired units.
A 'solar park' can decrease the cost of solar power significantly. The intial cost for setting up the project is very high. Once the plant is set up, its cost comes down. There is no extra cost except managing the mirrors.

You don't have to adjust to any fluctuations in cost. In fact there is no fuel cost. It (solar plant) can go on as long as the sun shines. Ofcourse, we got to make arrangements when the weather is cloudy. As per our calculations, the cost of solar power generation in India will come down to Rs 5-6 per kilo watt hour/unit in next five years. And this will be lower than the cost of a coal fired plant.

How do you propose to finance these projects? How many developers have shown interest in the Gujarat project so far?
As the project is very costly in the initial phases we will arrange finance for the solar developers.

We are already in talks with Asian Development Bank for this. As I said earlier once the project takes off, the cost of generation goes down, so finance is essential initially. About 10 international developers have already shown interest in the project.

The Central government had recently written to the state to consider setting up a solar SEZ in Gujarat. Any plans to park your solar project in the SEZ? Also, do you propose to set up hybrid plants?
We have held talks with the Central government on this. In fact, we are very hopeful about the National Solar Mission.

Along with developers, research and development, even component manufacturers have shown interest in our project. So there is a good export market. We can certainly consider that (SEZ). Hybrid plants are something else that we are considering at the moment.

Clinton Foundation to set up five solar parks in Gujarat

Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI), a programme of US based William J Clinton Foundation, today signed an memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Gujarat government for setting up solar parks in Gujarat. Each park will serve as a concentrated zone of solar development and will include 3,000 plus megawatts of solar generation as well as manufacturing facilities

"Gujarat has been the first state in the country and the fourth in the world to set up a seperate department for climate change. The proposed 3000 Mw solar power project will see an investment of over Rs 50,000 crore and create employment opportunity for over 20,000," said Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi during the MoU signing ceremony.

The project will generate over 5200 million units of clean and green energy and will reduce CO2 emission to the extent of 5.2 million tonnes on an annual basis.

“CCI will initially set up parks in two locations and the cost of generation would come down by then. In all they would set up about four to five parks over a period of time. Each of these parks would generate about 700-800 Mw of solar power,” said S Jagdeesan, principal secretary, energy and petrochemicals, government of Gujarat.

A solar park can decrease the cost of solar power significantly, due to economies of scale and use of less expensive domestically manufactured components and it can serve as a solar manufacturing and techonology hub.

The state government has come up with a seperate Solar Policy to harness the huge potential of solar energy that the state has and has already allotted a capacity of over 700 Mw to 34 national and international developers.

source: Business Standard

Gujarat Is No 1 - First time in India that any state-level Government University conducted an online entrance exam

Gujarat Technological University (GTU) has bagged the prestigious eIndia Digital Learning Award for ICT enabled University of the Year. The Jury’s Choice award was given in recognition of the path-breaking initiative of taking Gujarat Common Entrance Test (GCET) online. GTU conducted the first ever online entrance examination for a state university in July 2009. GTU partnered with MeritTrac Services, India’s largest Skill Assessment Company for the online entrance exam from 1st to 5th July 2009 at 37 online test centers spread across 11 cities in Gujarat. It was the first time in India that any state-level Government University conducted an online entrance exam. This exam was held for the admissions to Masters of Business Administration (MBA) and Masters of Computer Application (MCA) courses in all GTU affiliated Institutions throughout Gujarat. MeritTrac Services, as an assessment partner managed the entire technology & delivery process of the exam. A total of 22,797 candidates took this 2 hour Online Test, in three batches every day. The entire process was managed online right from application processing to online counseling for seat allocation. Instantaneous evaluation of candidate responses ensured that the individual candidate scores were computed and displayed to the candidate on test completion. This feature ensured complete transparency of the examination process and enhanced the candidate’s belief in the admission process of the University.

According to Manish Bharadwaj, IAS, ex-Director of Technical Education, Govt. of Gujarat expressed great satisfaction at having won the award and praised the efforts of the staff & faculty of Gujarat Technological University for having successfully delivered GCET 2009. He also thanked the team from MeritTrac that had worked tirelessly as a partner to deliver GCET.

According to Prof. Bhuptani, Registrar, Gujarat Technological University, “We are elated to have won the eIndia Digital Learning ICT-enabled University Award 2009.For the first time in India, a state university successfully automated the examination delivery process-ensuring a fair & transparent testing process and a quick turnaround in announcing results. We are pleased to have found a capable partner in MeritTrac for successfully executing online Gujarat Common Entrance Test.”

MeritTrac supported the university in automating the examination delivery process and by ensuring quick turn around time for publishing question papers in a secure manner, setting up testing infrastructure across the state within existing college computer labs, managing the entire test administration and announcing results. GCET also had an online solution for student counseling & allocation of college seats.

According to Madan Padaki, Co- Founder & CEO, MeritTrac Services “We are delighted that GTU bagged the jury’s choice award for the ICT-enabled University 2009. We credit the visionary leadership at GTU which supported us all the way, creating a path-breaking online examination process for similar exams across India. We foresee more institutions joining the online bandwagon enthused by this success”

courtesy: Business Standard

2.5 lakh students benefit from 'Flood IT' initiative of Gujarat Bank

2.5 lakh students have benefited from the 'Flood IT' initiative, launched by Gujarat Urban Bank Co-operative Banks Federation, within six months of its launch on February 10 this year.

Gujarat Urban Bank Co-operative Banks Federation chairman Jyotindra Mehta said ''The ‘Flood IT’ project has achieved remarkable success in a very limited span. Around 145 banks and 100 other organisations have participated in the scheme.'' He said ''More than 600 branches of various banks have extended loans to customers under the scheme and Intel has provided benefit of this ‘knowledge revolution’ to the people in the remote villages by distributing computers through millennium vehicle.'' The success of the scheme can be gauged from the fact that within six months, around 9,000 villages in 24 districts have reaped the benefit of this initiative, which has provided level playing field to the students in these villages and helped in making them competent to compete with their peers in the cities

Modi’s leadership and the challenges for Gujarat

kindly go to the link

some of the points mentioned and discussed in the links are

Consider statistics obtained from the Central Statistical Organisation (CSO), state government and other published data, which tell a very different story. According to a December report published by none other than the high priest of individual liberty, free markets and peace, the Cato Institute, the average rate of growth of Gujarat’s gross domestic product (GDP) went from a good 5.8% (1980-90) to 8.15% (1991-99) to 10.14% (2000-06).

CSO estimates that when one looks at industrial development, the output value went up from Rs7,160 crore (1980-81) to Rs27,593 crore (1990-91) to Rs307,955 crore (2005-06) in the state, and the corresponding value for net value added by industry went up from Rs1,139 crore to Rs4,468 crore to Rs47,953 crore during the same period. Likewise, the Union ministry of industry, through its department of industrial policy and promotion, maintains a record of what it calls the Industrial Entrepreneurial Memorandum, under the Industries (Development and Regulation) Act, 1951, based on the actual permissions taken to set up industry in a state; this registered spectacular growth from Rs8,224 crore (1991) to Rs10,561 crore (2001) to Rs1.1 trillion in 2008. More recent studies by the International Food Policy Research Institute show the ongoing dramatic transformation in agrarian growth rates in Gujarat over the past decade, which has been lauded by it as not just record-breaking in the country but globally as well.

for more of this go to the link ; http://www.livemint.com/2009/08/23221159/Modi8217s-leadership-and-th.html?h=B

Gujarat can be 'Pharma Hub of World

Quality assurance and brand building image has helped the Pharmaceutical Industry of the state and has the potential to become the 'Pharma Hub of World', Gujarat Health Minister Jaynarayan Vyas said today.

Gujarat Government has already intiated its supportive actions with decreasing excise duty from 16 per cent to 4 per cent .''

The health ministry is going to set up two more National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL) laboratories, one each, at Rajkot and Bhuj.

At present, Gujarat has one NABL accredited lab at Vadodara.