IT News
Imphal, July 16,
The just completed first session of the North Eastern Council (NEC) meeting held at Shillong is likely to bring many changes in the field of development of the state with Governor of Manipur Dr. Najma Heptulla drawing attention for allotment of fund should be based on development index.
Talking to media persons yesterday at Raj Bhavan, Najma Heptulla said that during the first session of the North Eastern Council (NEC) meeting, action-taken plan report on the 64th plenary and approval of the draft annual plan of NEC for 2018-19 was discussed. .
The meeting chaired by Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh discussed some of the major issues such as transformation of several districts in the region, strengthening livelihood programmes, water resources management, catchment area treatment through afforestation, doubling farmers’ income by 2022, road connectivity.
“The money distribution should not be based on the size and population of the states because we cannot match Assam. The parameter for the distribution of the money should be based on developmental index”, she drew the attention of the session but said that they have taken to extent but not to her satisfaction.
The Governor said that she took the responsibility of representing the state since both the Chief Minister and Chief Secretary were not able to attend due to the prevailing situation in the state. She added that she was very vocal about the issues of the state and as result NEC who were in the point of abandoning some projects of the state, decided to improve the infrastructures by approving 29 projects for the state. She further states that the Home Minister chairing the meeting was very significant because the North East region has border and security issues, and NEC was always under the Home Ministry and now it has become much stronger.
Saying that her focus is on the issues of development because the state has suffered a lot due to blockades and bandhs. The state was not given a good share of money and she asked for more within the NEC. Among the eight states in the NE region, seven are small and faces similar problems. That was why she drew the attention for distribution of money on developmental index.
During the briefing, the governor also brought up issue of a dying Loktak Lake, which is a thing to be concerned about as tourism of the state is dependent on Loktak . And more focus should be given on infrastructures and roads because the state is landlocked and added that she is going to pursue on more and more issues related with our landlocked state. She said that without proper availability of petroleum products, black marketing would flourish. The central government should focus more on the NE region. About the plans of any upcoming projects in the state, the Governor said that we should first finish the projects here because leaving them incomplete will not be useful and further projects will come up as per the priority given by the state government.
She further added that the vendors of Ima Markets in the state are not aware of Central Schemes like pension, insurance and health which were announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the first year of his tenure. She urges that all the Central Government Schemes be translated into local dialects so that all the people in the state can be aware about the schemes meant for them.
