The Agriculture department on Monday launched a soil testing drive--Apni Mitti Pehchano--that will be carried out in four phases across the state. Several mobile soil testing labs were flagged off for rural areas from the Agriculture directorate in the state capital by Agriculture Director Mukesh Gautam in the presence of senior officials of the department.

Gautam said the four-phase campaign from May 7 to May 28 aimed at collecting about 26 lakh samples of soil and making farmers aware of the health of their soil after testing.

The Uttar Pradesh government has stepped up efforts to attract private companies from the United States and South Africa to set up units to generate electricity from solid wastes.

"I am very much interested in this scheme. I really want such units to be set up in big cities. This will not only take care of power problem but also help the urban local bodies to manage domestic waste," Urban Development Minister Mohammad Azam Khan told 'The Pioneer' here on Friday.

LUCKNOW: A public interest litigation (PIL) was filed in the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court on Monday against the alleged double standards adopted by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in arresting those accused in the multi-crore National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) scam. Filed by Lucknow-based social activist, Nutan Thakur, the PIL came up for hearing before a division bench of Justice Imtiyaz Murtaza and Justice V C Gupta. The bench has posted the hearing for Tuesday.

Reviving its pet Lohia Gram Yojana, Samajwadi Party Government has sanctioned Rs 250 crore for building infrastructure in over 1000 villages having population over 250. The decision to revive this Yojana was taken in the meeting of the Mandi Parishad, chaired by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav here on Tuesday. Yadav is Chairman of the Parishad. He also announced concession for the potato exporters.

The project, to be launched in the second week of May, has been named after socialist icon Dr Ram Manohar Lohia as he had always raised the issues of farmers, according to PWD and Irrigation Minister Shivpal Singh Yadav. Giving details of the project to expand irrigation facilities across the state, Yadav said on Saturday that the government has earmarked Rs 3,000 crore for setting up new tubewells in the state.

With an aim to improve the financial condition of farmers the State Government has formed Farmers’ Commission, headed by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav that would formulate pro-farmer policies. A highly placed Government official said that this proposed Commission will have 12 members including agriculture scientists, heads of different farmers’ associations, officials of the Department of agriculture and Mandi Parishad and prominent agriculture analysts.

Advocating poor fiscal scenario of UP, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has demanded that the Centre should share 90 per cent of the financial burden of all projects of National Ganga River Basin Authority. He also said that a moratorium on maintenance of all projects should be enhanced from the existing five years to 15 years. Addressing the meeting of NGRBA in New Delhi on Tuesday, Yadav said that seven Centrally sponsored projects worth Rs 1341.6 crore were underway in UP. “Major cities like Kannauj, Allahabad, Kanpur and Varanasi are situated on the banks of Ganges.

The Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), which took up cudgels against the health hazards due to junk food has hailed the UP governments decision to put an immediate ban on its sale within the premises and outside ICSE, CBSE and UP Board schools. “It is a significant and laudable step towards protecting our children from future health impairments,” pointed Director of CSE Sunita Narain while hailing the UP government’s decision to ban the sale of junk food and carbonated soft drinks on the school campuses and outside.

Honey might be no longer `nectar' for users. For, a test conducted by Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) found that it was more of a sugar served with antibiotics. The genuineness of the honey notwithstanding, the producers are turning their venture into one of the `sweetest' businesses.
A prime example of it is laundering of Chinese honey to United States (US) and Europeon Union (EU) through third world countries including India. China is the biggest producer and exporter of honey.