National Rainfed Area Authority (NRAA), MoA&FW organized a National Level Technical Committee (NLTC) meeting under the REWARD (Rejuvenating Watersheds for Agricultural Resilience through Innovative Development) programme yesterday ( 22.09.26)  at NASC Complex, New Delhi.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of NRAA, Dr. Chandra Shekhar Kumar, IAS presided over the meeting.  Dr. A. K. Nayak, DDG (NRM), ICAR ,Shri Nitin Khade, IAS, Joint Secretary (WM), DoLR, Dr. Subrat Panda, IAS, Director (DSC&WD), Odisha, Shri Upendra Pratap Singh, Commissioner, WDD, Karnataka (online) also attended the meeting. The scientists and representatives of State Level Nodal Agency (SLNA) Odisha and Karnataka, Technical partners from ICAR Institutes, Agricultural Universities, IIT, NGOs, consortium partners, REWARD PMU team of DoLR and NRAA, and CoE-WM (approximately 45 participants) participated in the meeting. The meeting was coordinated by Dr. Susama Sudhishri, Technical Expert (Watershed Development) and PI-REWARD, NRAA.

Dr. Chandra Shekhar Kumar, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of NRAA, emphasized on the validation of the statement / claim made in the draft NTG on the basis of data collected in the REWARD programme. He also advised the state Governments Odisha and Karnataka to share  the watershed data and Decision Support System (DSS) to all stakeholders. Dr. A. K. Nayak emphasized on integration of Land Resource Inventory (LRI) and Hydrology for improved planning of watersheds.

Dr. A. K. Nayak, DDG (NRM), ICAR said that methodologies adopted to arrive at certain results / conclusions should be clearly written in the NTG and web portals should be developed at the earliest.

Shri Nitin Khade, IAS, Joint Secretary (WM), DoLR opined that DPR preparation time may be compressed to 3 months from 6 months in order to get more time for execution of activities. Aspects of convergence of sectors should also be explored and may be included in the NTG.

At the start of the meeting, Dr. Susama Sudhishri presented the action taken report of the last NLTC meeting and also presented the additions made in the 2^nd draft of the National Technical Guidelines (NTG).

Dr. Susama requested the State Level Nodal Agencies of Odisha and Karnataka to share the recorded data with NRAA and consortium partners for analysis and preparation of reports, and validation of NTG. The NTG being developed will be used for future generation watershed development in our country under Watershed Development Component- Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana 3.0.

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SS/MS/DK

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