‘Clean environment important for economic progress’

Press trust of india
New Delhi, Sept 22: Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu Thursday said clean environment is important to avail the fruits of higher economic growth in the country and stressed on the need of high-speed clean transportation system. The cost involved in cleaning the environment eats into the economic progress. Therefore clean environment is very important for development, he said at AIMA conference here. Asserting that clean environment involves clean energy and clean transportation system, Prabhu said, “A massive cleanliness campaign has been started from September 17 to 25 across the country mobilising railway employees, civil societies and religious organisation.”
Highlighting the growing importance of technology, the Railway Minister said, “Technology is also important. Today so many technological innovations are happening. In Railways, technology is being used for many purposes including booking tickets faster. It is being used for addressing and redressing grievances on real time basis.” Stressing on the need for faster trains, he said, “Speed is required in decision making process and there is a need to increase train speed for which Railways has taken a series of steps.”
“We have to go beyond 350 kmph speed. We had recently organised a conference on the technology for ultra-high speed in which six major global players had participated. We have started working on this direction though it will take some time for this,” Prabhu said. Speaking at the event, Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore said, “There is no running away from hard work to achieve something in life. We need to practice hard to achieve something.” To a question on the government’s policy for information dissemination at the time of crisis like Kashmir violence, Rathore said, “Flow of information cannot be stopped. It is very important to put out all facts.”
Referring to the importance of emergence of new trends in communication technology, he said, “Communication needs to be improved to put across the views. We have started workshops on how to use social media effectively. Lots of efforts need to go into it.”