Central Government to amend NIMHANS Bill

NEW DELHI: Accepting the recommendations of the Parliamentary panel, the Centre has decided to amend the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences, Bangalore Bill, 2010.The meeting of the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday approved the proposal to keep the Union Health and Family Welfare Minister out as the president of the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences (NIMHANS) and that the president should be nominated by the Centre from among the members other than the director of the institute.As per the original Bill, it had proposed that the Union Health Minister should be the president of the institute. The Parliamentary standing committee on Health and Family Welfare, in its recommendations, had opposed the proposal. It recommended that a political person should not head the institute.“It is a well known fact that the ministers are entrusted with manifold responsibilities and functions. It becomes very unpractical to expect full attention at all times from ministers, that too in the functioning of premier institutes like NIMHANS and other similar bodies,” the committee observed.Briefing on the decisions of the Union Cabinet, Minister for Information and Broadcasting Ambika Soni said that as per the amendments approved by the Cabinet, the institute shall consist of the Chief Secretary or his nominee not below the rank of Secretary to the Government of Karnataka, ex officio. The National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences, Bangalore Bill, 2010 was introduced in the Rajya Sabha inDecember 2010 and referred to the department related standing committee. The standing committee presented its report in the Rajya Sabha on March 4.Ambika Soni said that the Cabinet approved the promulgation of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands Marine Fishing (Amendment) Regulation, 2011 by the President under Article 240 of the Constitution.She said that the approval will strengthen the coastal security in the coastline of the Union territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands in an effective manner by having a streamlined system of registration of all fishing vessels under a single law namely the Merchant Shipping Act, 1958.Soni said that the Cabinet also gave  approval for laying the Action Taken Memorandum on the recommendations contained in the sixteenth annual report of the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) for the year 2008-09 in both the Houses of Parliament.