BHUBANESWAR: Keeping an eye on 2019 elections, the Centre has launched an aggressive campaign to publicise the Narendra Modi Government’s flagship Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY).
As part of the campaign, Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan on Saturday flagged off mobile LED vans from Indian Oil Corporation’s office here.
“These mobile LED vans will move into the interiors of Odisha to create awareness on PMUY and safe practices of usage of LPG in a unique way,” Pradhan said.
He said the specially designed vehicles will work as a mobile theatre. These mobile LED vans will spread awareness about the safe practices of using domestic LPG as well act as moving centre for collection of know your customer (KYC) form from prospective eligible consumers. Ten such vehicles will ply in the State, he added.
In last 28 months, more than five crore BPL households across the country have benefitted from PMUY by getting LPG connections. In Odisha, 33 lakh connections have been released since its launch, he said.
IPPB opens in city
With the nationwide launching of India Post Payments Bank (IPPB), Pradhan inaugurated the IPPB branch in the city on Saturday. Speaking on the occasion, he said IPPB is a giant leap towards empowering rural India through financial inclusion. It will bring new economic and job opportunities in villages and also revolutionise the Indian Postal Services, he added. While more than 4,200 panchayats of the State are still out of the reach of banking facility, IPPB will bring in a paradigm shift in extending banking services to the people in rural areas, he added.
The Union Minister said more than 8,300 postmen and other delivery staff will bring banking facilities to the doorstep of the people of the State through 8,215 post offices.
Chief Post Master General Santosh Kumar Kamila said 33 IPPB branches and 165 access points were launched across the State. Remaining 8,050 access points will be rolled out by December 31, he added.
On this occasion, a special cover on IPPB was released by the CPMG and QR card was issued to new account holders.