Attn: Editor/News Desk
From Our Correspondent
GUWAHATI: It was on April 18, 2012, the then Union Cabinet headed by Prime Minister DR Manmohan Singh, had approved setting up of an autonomous organisation called North East Centre for Technology Application and Reach (NECTAR) at Shillong in Meghalaya with a total outlay of Rs 292 crore under the ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India.
The nodal centre for the Northeast was set up under the Societies Registration Act, 1860, and with a mandate to promote deployment of carefully selected technologies, emanating from the public-funded research institutions under Government of India and State Governments, in consultation with the respective state governments.
The centre was basically meant for helping entrepreneurs in the Northeast with technology innovations especially those working in the potential bamboo sector which is set to get a fillip after the recent decision of the Centre to exclude bamboo from the list of forest products.
However, even after coming into being way back in 2012, the entrepreneurs of the Northeast have hardly benefitted from the nodal centre which is yet to set up its full-fledged office in Shillong in sharp defiance of the MOA that states that the Centre must have its office in Shillong, Meghalaya.
However, to the utter dismay of concerned entrepreneurs of the region, the NECTAR which has virtually become a rehabilitation centre for some former bureaucrats, continues to operate from its rented premises from New Delhi incurring heavy expenditure in terms of rent. It has only set up a token office in Shillong, which is basically used as a guest house, to hoodwink the people of the state.
Following a plea made by Rajib Goswami, the President of Bamboo Industries Association of India, the Ministry of Science and Technology, vide letter No. AI/1/53/NECTAR/2016 dated October 24, 2016, directed the NECTAR to shift its office to Shillong from New Delhi.
Again on April 17, 2017, the office of the Minister of Science and Technology, Government of India directed the Secretary of the DST to take necessary action to make NECTAR shift its office to Shillong from New Delhi.
However, all these efforts and directives have failed to move the NECTAR office to Shillong where it must have been as per the Cabinet approval granted for its formation way back in April, 2012.
The MPs from the region to have been hardly audible in the issue of shifting the NECTAR office to Shillong much to the discouragement of the entrepreneurs of the region.
