Jammu Sep 20 PTI The Jammu Kashmir Rural Livelihoods Mission JKRLM will create an enabling environment for rural women enterprises by creating 35000 jobs in the union territory its director Dr Syed Sehrish Asgar said on MondayUnder an initiative of the JKRLM known as SAATH a rural enterprise acceleration programme for women launched by Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha women entrepreneurs of rural areas will be mentored and capacity-building workshops will be organised for them to help upscale their business ventures she saidA total of 8085 applicants from across Jammu and Kashmir have applied for the programme Asgar saidShe added that 500 enterprises with the highest potential have been chosen for an intensive training programme to be followed by mentoring while 5000 entrepreneurs will be exposed to various business enablement strategies including e-commerce sales and brandingAsgar said 45 per cent of the applicants reported that given the right support they can offer employment to over 27000 rural women in a year with an average of 75 potential jobs being created per rural enterprise when backed through SAATHThe remaining 55 per cent of the applicants saw a new employment generation potential of around two persons per enterprise taking the total employment potential to over 35000 in JK she saidThese 8000-odd SAATH programme applicants are employing approximately 12000 employees at present she added PTI AB IJT

New Delhi Sep 20 PTI With new retail licences coming into force from mid-November no liquor vends will open in 105 of the 272 municipal wards of Delhi from October 1 officials said on MondayUnder the new excise policy of the city government retail liquor sale licences have already been allocated to the highest bidders in 32 zones each having around 10 wards and 27 liquor vendsThe bidding process for the 32 zones concluded by the excise department in two phases in August and September earned a revenue of over Rs 8900 crore to the governmentThe Aam Aadmi Party AAP government in the national capital has decided to close down around 260 private liquor vends after September 30 There are a total of 849 liquor vends in the city a majority of which are run by three agencies of the Delhi governmentThe excise department in an order issued earlier this month allowed the Delhi government-run liquor vends to continue with the retail sale of liquor till November 16 after furnishing the requisite licence feeThe firms that have been given licences in the 32 zones under the new excise policy through bidding will start retail sale from November 17 the order saidThe officials said there are around 80 wards in the city without any liquor vend In 26 wards there are presently only privately-owned liquor vends that will close down from October 1 they addedPractically the 105 wards in the three municipal corporations in the city will have no functional liquor vend after September 30 an officer saidThe closure of privately-owned vends from October 1 may lead to a temporary shortage of liquor as only the government-run liquor stores will open for a month and a half prior to November 17 the officials saidThe new excise policy seeks an equitable distribution of liquor stores in the city by segmenting it into 32 zones Currently the spatial distribution of liquor vends is skewed with some wards having as many as 10 liquor vends and others having none the officials added PTI VIT RC