CHANDIGARH JULY 23: The Punjab government today decided to enhance the current allowance from Rs.600/- to Rs.1200/- per child per month with immediate effect for the visually handicapped children of the Blind School Jamalpur in district Ludhiana.
A decision to this effect was taken in a meeting held here under the chairmanship of Punjab Chief Minister Mr. Parkash Singh Badal as a follow up action to the recent visit of Mr. Badal to the Brail Bhawan, Jamalpur on 17th July.
Mr. Badal also asked the Secretary Water & Sanitation to immediately undertake the work to provide safe drinking water at a cost of Rs.12.85 lakh in the institute for blind students by the end of October. The Chief Minister also asked the Chief Secretary to send a team of senior officers to visit the institute of visually impaired Dehradun to seek expert advice for the upgradation of Brail Bhawan thereby increasing its intake capacity to 500 visually impaired students. He also directed the Finance Department to immediately release a sum of Rs.40 lakh for the installation of new brail press and a digital studio in the institute. Besides he also agreed in principle to upgrade the existing high school to 10+2 level.
The Chief Minister also deputed Director Sports to visit the Institute and prepared a detailed plan for the development and expansion of existing play grounds. He also asked the Mayor, Municipal Corporation Ludhiana to construct a foot over bridge at a cost of Rs.75 lakh across the Ludhiana-Chandigarh highway to ensure easy access to the visually impaired children to the institute.
Deputy Commissioner Ludhiana assured the Chief Minister that the works related to the construction of boundary wall and reception centre would be completed at the earliest from within the resources of district administration.
The meeting was attended by Chief Secretary RI Singh, Principal Secretary to Chief Minister DS Guru, Principal Secretary Finance DS Kalha, Secretary Social Security Harjit Singh, Secretary Water Supply & Sanitation PS Aujla, Special Secretary Planning Tejveer Singh, Director Social Security Rakhi Gupta Bhandari and Deputy Commissioner Ludhiana Sumer Singh Gurjar.