Govt decides to sue Gokhale

SHILLONG, Dec 6: The state government on Tuesday decided to file a defamation suit against Trinamool Congress (TMC) spokesperson Saket Gokhale for accusing an IAS officer of misusing $79.05 million or Rs 632 crore in the Meghalaya Ecotourism Infrastructure Development Project (MEIDP).
The government rejected the TMC leader’s allegations made on Monday.
Deputy Chief Minister Prestone Tynsong said Gokhale keeps on making such allegations against the state government. “Allegations should be substantiated with documents. The government has no more patience as Gokhale makes such allegations by collecting information from here and there and putting them in the public domain,” he said.
Giving details of the MEIDP, Tynsong said the government received a sanction of Rs 731 crore for implementing different segments of the project from 2022-2026.
Stating that the project is being implemented after an agreement signed among the Meghalaya government, the Centre and the New Development Bank (NDB), he said the government had to create a special purpose vehicle or subsidiary under the name of Meghalayan Age Ltd according to the guidelines of the bank.
Insisting that these projects are being implemented by the PWD, Tourism and Sports departments, Tynsong said the Meghalayan Age Ltd is only supposed to bring out the guidelines and after regularisation, the projects would come from other line departments.
He said the tender for the projects is being called by the respective departments and not the company.
Denying all allegations, Tynsong said projects worth Rs 230 crore have been allotted to date. Slamming Gokhale for trying to spoil the image of the government, he said the government has nothing to hide.