Delhi will get a ‘knowledge city’ in South Delhi very soon. The knowledge city will be a hub of industrial activities related to knowledge creation and its uses. An announcement has been made in this regard by Delhi’s Industry Minister Haroon Yusuf.

He also said that Delhi would set up two SEZs , one for Gem and Jewellery industry and another for IT , under the public private partnership (PPP) in a span of 30 months with the help of Delhi State Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (DSIIDC). This will create direct and indirect employment for over two lakh people.

It is notable that a new comprehensive industrial policy has been approved by Delhi Cabinet on Monday. The new policy focuses non-polluting industries like IT, IT enabled services, Hi-tech, sophisticated knowledge based and services and discourages labour-intensive manufacturing sector. As Haroon says that the government is now focusing on Infrastructure development, decongestion, promoting ‘walk to work’, industry consultation and other areas.

The Union government has already been approved both the SEZs in last month. While the SEZ for Gems and Jewellery will be set up in an area of 41.4 acres at an estimated cost of rupees 489 crore the IT SEZ will cost around rupees 395 crore and will have an area of 26 acre. The IT SEZ will have a convention halls, hotels, hospitals and residential accommodation. IT SEZ will provide direct employment to 36000 people and indirect employment to 1.08 lakh people.

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit today exhorted children to function as an Environment-ambassador. In an interaction session with school children at Delhi Secretariat she requested children to at least plant seven saplings and preserve them as their family member to make the city green.

Stressing upon the need of utilization of recycled paper she said that practice may help in saving around 40,000 trees in a year. She also underlined the need of making mandatory use of recycled papers in business houses

Secretary (Environment) Dharmendra Kumar informed the students about the scheme of Eco-club in schools and colleges. He said that to make more effective and action oriented, the department has initiated a programme called vacation programme for the eco-club students since last six years. Under the scheme, 80 students (40 from govt. schools and 40 from pvt. schools) selected through a competitive process. These children were trained for 10 days in Delhi during winter vacation and 5 days out side Delhi during summer vacation.

About 100 students of different schools of Delhi to meet Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and discuss the issues related to the environment and Green Delhi. These students will belong to eco-club of different schools.

It is notable that these Eco-Clubs have played an important role to increase green area in Delhi and to make successful campaigns like anti fire-crackers, say no to plastic bags, rain water harvesting and several other campaigns related to better and green environment in the city. These Eco-clubs were started in 1998 with a participation of 100 schools. Now the number of such schools having their eco-clubs has been increased by 25 times. There about 2500 Eco-Clubs in the schools and colleges. About 100 colleges and educational institutions too have been included in this category over a period of time.

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit has been interacting with the representatives and member students of Eco-Clubs regularly and discusses several issue about the environment. This time the role of these Eco-Clubs have become more important as Delhi is organizing Commonwealth Games this year.

It is a good news for Delhi’s new and young entrepreneur. Setting up new ventures or business will soon be easier in the capital as Delhi cabinet has today given its nod for setting up a single window system for them. The system named as the business facilitation council will be set up in the Industries Department to facilitate the prospective entrepreneurs in obtaining a number of clearances from various Department/Agencies for setting up of Industrial Enterprises.

The Council would in other words provide a Single Window System to deliver the services of the Govt. with more transparency, accuracy and speed. The Council would be headed by the Secretary and Commissioner of Industries Department and Joint Commissioner of Industries. There will be maximum 20 members in the council. Speaking to the media Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit expressed confidence that new mechanism will help in ensuring hassel free services to the prospective entrepreneurs and will also provide a conducive environment for Industrial growth.

It is notable that an entrepreneur has to face multiple agencies before getting final approval of his project. The single window system will help these entrepreneurs in terms of speedy approval of the projects.