Remote sensing agency's project to save bio-diversity: In the first major effort to preserve bio-diversity, the departments of bio-technology and space have launched an ambitious project for comprehensive survey and classification of all bio-diversity rich areas in India which is home for richest flora and fauna in the world. The national remote sensing agency (NRSA) in Hyderabad, which has been entrusted with the task of documenting andcataloguing the rich repository of natural wealth using imaging techniques, would complete first phase of the Rs 8 crore project by end of next year, the NRSA director Dr D P Rao told PTI.

Ignou clarification on internet access points: Indira Gandhi national open university (Ignou) said on Sunday that no institution or individual had been authorised to open new internet access points for its computer courses. Certain institutions had issued advertisements in newspapers claiming to be the authorised Ignou agency for opening these access points, Ignou said in a statement. The university clarified that no middleman has been authorised for the job and Ignou was directly giving the permission to open such IAPS.

Plan panel raps Prasar Bharati: Regretting that no broadcasting policy had been formulated by Prasar Dbharati, a parliamentary standing committee has rejected as `hardly convincing' the attempt to blame non-implementation of programmes or shortage of staff to delayed staff sanctions oruncertainty about plan allocations. In its seventh report on the working of All India Radio, the parliamentary standing committee on communications said it failed to understand why no concrete action was taken despite the fact that these problems were being faced year after year. Noting that no lesson was learnt from the failure to achieve targets in previous years, the committee headed by Somnath Chatterjee urged Prasar Bharati to give serious thought to resolving these problems.

TN health proposal forwarded to World Bank: The Union government has forwarded the Tamil Nadu government's proposal for a Rs 850-crore health scheme to the World Bank. Union minister of state for health and family welfare Dalit Ezhimalai told a press conference in Tiruchirapalli on Sunday that under the proposed scheme, primary health centres would become community health centres and district headquarters hospitals would be elevated to the general hospital status with all modern facilities. The powers hitherto vested withthe director general of health and secretary to health in the ministry had been decentralised so that emergency decisions were taken to ensure health care of the needy.

Rs 122.44 cr spent for development of telecom in Assam: The ministry of communication has spent Rs 122.44 crore - Rs 32 crore more than the previous year - for the development, expansion and upgradation of telecommunication system in rural and urban areas of Assam during 1997-98. An official report said in Agartala on Sunday that an amount of Rs 119.92 crore was allocated for the development of telecommunications in Assam. However, the ministry had spent Rs 2.52 crore more than the allocated funds. In 1996-97, Rs 90.71 crore was spent in the state for expansion, development and upgradation programme, the sources said.

EMRs will lead to hike in drug prices, fear experts: Experts fear that the main impact of government's proposal to grant exclusive marketing rights (EMRs) to drugs and agrochemical products will be on prices ofmedicines which will shoot up, making it extremely difficult for poor people to afford them. In a country where a majority of the population does not have access to modern medicines even in the present patent regime in which drug prices are among the lowest in the world, medicines will go further out of reach of the poor under an EMR regime, they said.

Master plan for tea cultivation in Tripura: The Tripura government has taken up a master plan for cultivation of tea by small growers and poor tribals by using the vast waste and deserted lands in the plains and the hilly areas of the state. Under the master plan, a target has been fixed for producing about 1.5 million kg of tea in 2.5 thousand acres of lands from the year 2002.