Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu participated in the International Yoga Day Event which took place at A1 Convention Centre in Vijayawada. Speaking on the occasion, Chief Minister said that Yoga will reduce the burden of stress and improve the health, happiness and ultimately the wealth of the people.

Chief Minister has performed various Asanas on this occasion, along with Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu.

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Many senior citizens are left alone themselves as their children are settled abroad or in some cases they face abuse from children. People who have money are spending around 10000/- per month in private old age homes. Many poor old people can’t afford and are facing difficulties to survive.

Andhra Pradesh government is planning to start three old age homes across Andhra Pradesh. These would be located in Visakhapatnam, Guntur and Anantapur. Each Old age home would come up with a capacity of 100 people. These old age home are to be come up under public-private partnership (PPP) model.

Government is planning to allot Rs.1.39 crore for each of the old age home. The expenses of salaries would be borne by government and the other expenses of food, cloths, medicines, rent and other expenses will be borne by the NGO under the PPP mode. The state government has directed the collectors of the three districts to identify non-governmental organisations to take up the project.

Based on the study of the pros and cons on these three places, Old age homes would be set up in all the districts.

Akshaya Patra foundation had built a kitchen in Thullur of Capital region. From here mid-day meals would be supplied to nearby school students in Vijayawada and Guntur.

The kitchen can cook 15000 meals in 4 hours. Below is the photo gallery of the Akshaya Patra Kitchen in Thullur

Nepal is going to use Visakhapatnam Port as an alternative EXIM (Export-Import) gateway. Nepal is going to use Visakhapatnam Port as its second transshipment point for EXIM. Nepal is already using Halida port (Kolkata) for the past seven years, which handles around 40,000 TEUs of Nepal’s cargo every year.

Due to many problems faced in Halida port, Nepal has asked Government of India, to use Vizag port as an alternative. The Letters of exchange were signed in the last trip of Prime Minister to Nepal. The LoE is signed between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Nepalese counterpart K.P. Sharma Oli. While one LoE will provide for transit facilities for Nepal through the Visakhapatnam port, the other will allow for rail transport between Visakhapatnam and Nepal.

Vizag port is about 1,440 km from the Nepal border. The port has a handling capacity of 350,000 TEUs a year and the waiting time for container vessels here is less than two hours. Apart from this, it is directly linked to the inland container depot at Birgunj (nepal), which is in Nepal, by rail. Container Corporation of India too is willing to run container trains from Vizag to Birgunj. There are other advantages like lesser turn round time of vessel, congestion free and demurrage free operations, possibility of acting as distribution hub and good connectivity to the East Asian countries, among others.

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