Salary of chairman and members of all boards and commissions of the Bihar government will now be at par with that of the chairman and members of the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC), state’s chief secretary Amir Subhani on Tuesday.
This was among the 35 agenda items discussed and approved by the Cabinet at its meeting chaired by chief minister Nitish Kumar.
Briefing reporters after the meeting, Subhani said that currently, the BPSC chairman gets salary of ₹2.25 lakh and dearness allowance (DA) at the approved rate, while members draw around ₹2 lakh plus DA.
There are more than three dozen boards and commissions waiting for the appointment of chairmen and members for the past five years or so.
In another decision, the Cabinet approved one-time rebate in tax liability on vehicles aged more than 15 years for declaring them scrap. The transport department had proposed total waiver of penalty and 90% relief in road tax for private vehicles, aged more than 15 years. However, there will be no liability of tax or penalty on the government vehicles. The chief secretary said that the decision was taken with a view to getting rid of over-aged and polluting vehicles.
Relief for farmers
The Cabinet also approved the agriculture department’s proposal for releasing a sum of ₹100 crore from the Bihar State Contingency Fund for meeting additional expanses on offering diesel subsidy to farmers for irrigation owing to deficient rains. The department was earlier allocated ₹50 crore for distribution among farmers as diesel subsidy.
In another important step, the cabinet approved the department’s proposal to offer compensation to farmers for production loss to vegetables due to unfavourable weather conditions. Earlier, farmers used to get compensation for loss of crops only.
New Ganga bridge
In its bid to improve trans-Ganga road communication between north and south Bihar, the Cabinet approved the release of ₹131.67 crore to be given to the construction company for building the four-lane bridge over river Ganga between Tajpur and Bakhtiyarpur. The sum has been approved by the state government in anticipation of release of the same amount from the Central government as viability gap funding for the project. The bridge will connect NH 31 and 28 after it’s complete.
