#RealtyNewsRoundUp: Govt Approves Project To Stop Stubble Burning To Fight Pollution

With the Delhi-National Capital Region and other northern states facing severe pollution, the environment ministry on December 28 approved a regional project to tackle stubble burning, one of the major contributors to air pollution. Awareness generation and capacity-building activities for farmers to adopt alternative practices and a slew of technological interventions for management of crop residue along with existing machineries will be part of the project. The first phase of the project has been approved at a cost of approximately Rs 100 crore for Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan.

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In a first, Sion Panvel Tollways, a special purpose vehicle of Essel Infraprojects set up to manage toll collection on the Sion-Panvel Highway, has decided to handover the toll plaza to the state, citing non-payment of dues to the tune of Rs 689 crore, from December 29. With this, the Essel group company becomes the first toll collection company in the state to walk back on the concession agreement and stop toll collection.

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The railways has re-categorised its stations using new criteria, which also take into account the footfall and strategic importance besides revenues, with a view to plan services and passenger amenities in an effective and more focused manner. The earlier criteria for categorisation of stations were based on the annual passenger earnings only, and they were grouped into seven categories. That scheme has now been revised to include footfalls at the station as a criterion and they have been clubbed into three groups: Non-Suburban, Suburban and Halt.

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Fourteen people were killed and 19 others injured after a major fire broke out in a building at Kamala Mills Compound in Mumbai's Lower Parel, an official said on December 29. The fire broke out shortly after December 28 midnight on the third floor of the four-storeyed building on Senapati Bapat Marg, a commercial hub of the city, a civic official said. "The cooling operations are underway. Some of the injured people are in critical condition," the official said.

Meanwhile, a fire tore through a Bronx apartment building, killing at least 12 people and leaving four others fighting for their lives, in New York's deadliest fire in decades, officials said. The devastating blaze broke out shortly before 7:00 pm (local time) on December 28 in the 25-apartment building opposite the Bronx Zoo, one of the most popular tourist attractions in the US financial capital.

Source: Media reports