From CK Nayak
Demand for revamp of DoNER Ministry, NEC
New Delhi: Members of Parliament from the North East region, cutting across party lines, will soon meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi to demand revamp of the DoNER Ministry and the North Eastern Council for meaningful growth of the region for which these two are meant for.
This was disclosed by former Lok Sabha Speaker and Tura MP Purno A. Sangma at a meeting of the Federation of Industry and Commerce of North Eastern Region (FINER) here on Tuesday night.
The Minister for DoNER should continue to be the Chairman of the NEC but there should be a full-fledged Deputy Chairman on the pattern of the Planning Commission, Purno said.
Both DoNER Minister Bikram Singh and MoS for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju were present in the meeting along with a host of MPs from all the eight Northeastern states. Lone Lok Sabha member from Sikkim, P.D. Rai, presided over the meeting.
From his experience, Purno said that the mandatory 10 per cent budgetary allocation by each ministry which started during the first NDA regime is just passed on by the ministries to the DoNER which should not be the case. The NEC is also functioning on similar lines taking up only small inter-state projects, he said.
Time has come when the restive North East cannot wait for peace for its basic development, Purno said. On the other hand time has come for massive development which only can bring peace in the region, he said.
The former Speaker also urged all to look beyond the region to the neighboring countries and South East Asian nations for development.
The region can work in the line of the European Union, he said.
Speakers from FINER agreed that the Centre should work on bringing together the states of the North East under one economic zone. FINER Chairman, R.S. Joshi, said such an initiative by the Centre will pave the way for the sustainable development of the entire region.
The industry body also lamented that work on several projects like the East-West Corridor, second bridge over Brahmaputra and highways expansion has been progressing at extremely slow pace.
The two Congress MPs from Meghalaya – Vincent H. Pala and Wansuk Syiem – attended the programme.