Question raised in Lok Sabha on Effluent Treatment Plant, 02/08/2016. Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEF&CC) is implementing a scheme to fund setting up of Common Effluent Treatment Plants (CETPs) for treatment of effluents generated from Small Scale Industries (SSI) located in clusters. 193 CETPs have been established with 178 operational and 15 are under construction. The State-wise list of CETPs is given in the annexure.

Question raised in Lok Sabha on Depletion in Forest Area/Cover, 02/08/2016. Forest Survey of India, Dehradun is carrying out the assessment of forest cover of the country biennially and the findings are published in India State of Forest Report. The latest report in the series is India State of Forest Report 2015. As per this report, the total forest cover of the country is 7, 01,673 square kilometers which is 21.34% of the total geographical area of the country. There is a net increase of 3775 square kilometers in the forest cover of the country as compared with India State of Forest

Question raised in Lok Sabha on Deaths due to Pollution, 02/08/2016. There are no conclusive data available across the country to establish direct correlation of death exclusively due to indoor and outdoor air pollution. The details of funds released to various monitoring agencies under National Air Quality Monitoring Programme (NAMP) for air pollution monitoring during 2012-2016 are given at Annexure-I.

Question raised in Rajya Sabha on Closure of Coal Based Power Plants, 01/08/2016. State wise list of coal based power plants shut down in the country during the recent past (from April to June, 2016) along with the reasons thereof is Annexed. Coal based Thermal Power Plants are set up keeping in view the availability of land, water, fuel etc.

Question raised in Rajya Sabha on Areas covered by dense forests, 01/08/2016. Forest cover of the country is assessed biennially and published as India State of Forest Report (ISFR) by Forest Survey of India, Dehradun, an organization under Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change. As per India State of Forest Report-2015, the forest cover of the country is 7, 01,673 square kilometers. The forest cover is divided into three classes namely Very Dense Forest (VDF), Moderately Dense Forest (MDF) and Open Forest (OF).

Question raised in Lok Sabha on Norms for Packaged and Fast Food, 29/07/2016. Some cases of violation of food safety norms have come to the notice of Food Safety and Standards Authority of India. Although, no separate data for foreign and Indian companies is maintained centrally by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), as per the information made available by State/UT Governments, the details of samples of food items collected, tested, found not conforming and action taken during the years 2012-13, 2013-14 and 2014-15 are at Annexure-I, II and III respectively.

Question raised in Lok Sabha on Food Adulteration, 29/07/2016. Some cases of adulteration in food items have come to the notice of the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI). As per the information made available by State/UT Governments to FSSAI, the state-wise details of samples of food articles collected, tested, found not conforming to the prescribed standards and action taken during last three years, are at Annexure-I, II & III.

Question raised in Rajya Sabha on Contingency plans for farmers to tackle with natural calamities, 29/07/2016. The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) has prepared District Agricultural Contingency Plans (DACP) to tackle any eventuality in agriculture sector including horticulture, livestock, poultry, and fisheries. These plans provide suitable technological interventions to minimize the losses due to weather aberrations viz. droughts, floods, cyclones, hailstorms, heat and cold waves etc. So far, contingency plans for 614 districts of the country have been prepared.

Question raised in Rajya Sabha on Compensation for drought affected farmers, 29/07/2016. The details regarding assistance approved from NDRF during the Financial Year 2015-16 for drought affected States on the basis of the Memoranda received is at Annexure. The State Governments are to take utmost care and ensure that all individual beneficiary-oriented assistance from SDRF/NDRF is necessarily/mandatorily disbursed through the bank account of the beneficiary.

Question raised in Lok Sabha on Water Treatment, 28/07/2016. As reported by the States in the online Integrated Management Information System of the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, there exist 2,230 water quality testing laboratories at the State, District, Sub-Divisional, Block levels and also certain mobile water testing laboratories. State/UT-wise details of water quality testing laboratories including Chhattisgarh State is at Annexure.