Editor,
NEHU is not only known as the place for providing higher education to students of this country but also attracts students from other countries. This is a place where there is exchange and transmission of ideas among the students, teachers and researchers. And in return they are moulded to become the future leaders, policy makers and citizens responsible for building the nation. But the environment here is often disturbed by the tragedies faced by students (especially) of the university. For instance, a student fell from the building( hostel) and lost his life (2010), students being beaten in the presence of the security guards ( 2011), and recently, a PhD student lost his life in a mishap( March, 2012, just few yards from NEHU Gate No. 2. No one seems to know how exactly he died.
Where is the security of students who have come to seek and learn? Will the authorities take necessary action or ignore it as just another accident? This is a matter of our career and life. May I suggest that like all other universities NEHU too should have a police outpost in the campus or in their vicinities for the safeguard of the University. And this will not be just for students’ safety but for teachers, non-teaching staffs and their families, too. It may be time to open Gate no. 1 and use it to avoid traffic congestion in Gate no.2.
It is our request to the authorities (VC, Registrar, Dean of students’ welfare and all the concerned individuals) to please pay attention to the security of the students, not just verbally but in deeds.
Yours etc.,
Concerned students
NEHU, Shillong
Wanted a grass-roots approach to development
Editor,
In my last letter related to the vision and implementation of the Basin Livelihood Project by the state government I had said it would be good and unique, if the poorest of poor households are the actual beneficiaries and a baseline survey is
reworked. But it is learnt from sources that it would be more of a top down approach rather than analysing than adopting the right strategy of approach. In fact the government should study what type of projects would be effective and responsive according to the type of topography and climate patterns rather than taking everything as a lump some. As Mohrmem expressed in his columns nothing can happen until you get down to the grass roots. Perhaps those officers responsible for the project should take time off to get first hand experience by analysing the needs of the poorest. As they say until you learn to become one like them it is useless to say that development will happen.
Yours etc.,
Dominic S Wankhar.
Tluh, Jaintia Hills
Not so fishy after all
Editor,
Wanshan Khardewsaw’s middle page article (ST 21st March 2012) in your esteemed daily calls for a response. The author made a statement that Rs.1200 crore would be spent only in this financial year on the Aquaculture Mission when the state budget was only Rs 3535 crore. It’s a wrong statement. In fact, the investment of Rs.1200 crore would be made through a five year period, co-terminus with the 12th Five Year Plan. If we take into account the tentatively projected plan size for the entire 12th Plan period at about Rs.30,000 crore then the projection of Rs.1200 crore for Fisheries would work out to only 4% of the total outlay. A land with so much of water, so much of unemployment and desperate shortage of fresh water fish – doesn’t it deserve this much investment on a sector that had never received any attention in the past?
As for the ‘negligence’ toward West Khasi Hills, it ought to be clarified that the warmer parts of that district too have potential for fisheries. Cold water fisheries is another possibility for West Khasi Hills. Besides, some parts of West Khasi Hills still being pristine, several river based fish sanctuaries are being planned for that district, from the perspective of developing aqua tourism as also conserving the native and indigenous fish species.
I have chosen only to respond to the factual inaccuracies. Incidentally, the Mission document is a public document and is available on the Meghalaya government’s web site and can be downloaded by anyone. I wish the author had read the document, especially since he is a research scholar, before choosing to make statements, most of which are prima facie, assumptive.
Yours etc
K.N.Kumar, IAS
Principal Secretary (Fisheries)
Government of Meghalaya