The Himachal Pradesh cabinet on Tuesday decided to lease out 10 more acres to the Spice Board of India to set up a spice park in the Kangra valley. This land would be provided on the campus of the HP Agriculture University in Palampur.

The Cabinet also decided to introduce new licences for inter-state sale of bottled Indian made foreign spirits by non-manufacturer dealers. Currently, the export of bottled spirits is allowed only from distilleries, breweries and bottling plants on receipt of import permit issued by the excise and taxation department.

For state value-added tax, it was decided that a branch of any nationalised bank could function as a treasury bank for government transactions.

The cabinet also gave its nod for providing financial assistance of Rs 40 crore to the state-run Himachal Pradesh State Cooperative Marketing And Consumer's Federation Ltd (HIMFED) as margin money from National Co-operative Development Corporation for production, processing, marketing, storage, export and import of agricultural produce.

The cabinet gave its approval for transferring land in the name of National Council of Science Museum, Ministry of Culture for the construction of Science Centre at Palampur in the campus of H P Agriculture University. Approval was accorded for the felling of trees on government and private land in Shimla as recommended by the Cabinet sub-committee.

Permission was also given to reduce the permit fee of kail pine cones to Rs 500 a quintal instead of Rs 1,000 as there was a sharp drop in kail cone export due to the raising of export fee.

Courtesy: Business Standard