ITANAGAR, Oct 1: The Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Tuesday strongly reiterated on the need for separate IAS, IPS and IFS cadres for Arunachal Pradesh, stating that this would “set the pace of development in the state to pick up.”
Speaking during the BJP’s state executive meeting here, the chief minister said “due to absence of separate civil service cadre for Arunachal, the efficiency of state bureaucracy has been crippled.”
“Civil service officers posted from Delhi come to Arunachal for short duration.
By the time an officer gets the idea of the system here, they are transferred elsewhere taking with them wealth of knowledge and causing huge institutional memory loss. Such continuous drain of knowledge keeps the pace of work slow and hindered,” said the chief minister.
He also added that such hindrances in higher bureaucracy make “officers at the directorate level to work according to their own whims and fancies without any sense of ownership and responsibilities.”
Calling for such ineffective working culture to “be destroyed forever,” the chief minister said if Arunachal gets its own separate civil service cadre, then sense of ownership and responsibility and institutional knowledge will prevail.
A resolution for separate civil service cadre for Arunachal was moved by the chief minister, which was unanimously supported by all members present during the meeting.
Further, sending a strong message to non-performing officers at the senior bureaucracy level, the chief minister declared that he would not hesitate to invoke the provisions of Rule 56(j) of the central civil services (Pension) rules.
“Officers failing to perform will be made to compulsory retire or even terminated. This is to send good message across and whip up efficiency level in the bureaucracy,” the chief minister said.
Khandu also declared that there is “no commission system in works department, wherein huge percentage as commission is deducted by the department for release of payments to the contractors.”
Calling to spread the message that such deducting of money from contractors is illegal, the chief minister asked the citizens to report any such malpractice directly to the chief minister’s office for strict action to be initiated against the officers involved.
Deputy Chief Minister Chowna Mein, in his speech highlighted the measures taken by the Government of India to boost the Indian economy. He informed that India is the world’s seventh largest economy by nominal gross domestic product (GDP) and the third largest by purchasing power parity (PPP), which is expected to grow by 7 percent in 2019 and 7.2 percent in the year 2020.
He said that the Government of India is giving top priority to the economic development of the country and to boost the Indian economy, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has made many historic announcements on 20 September, 2019 to boost the economy, encourage investment and to create new opportunities towards job creation.
“These announcements will ultimately lead to the fast growth in industrial development and benefit a large number of small traders and public,” Mein said.
The deputy CM also informed about changes and modifications under the goods and services tax (GST) which will benefit the common man.
Some modifications include: No GST on hotel rooms below Rs 1000 and the rate of GST on hotel rooms ranging from Rs 1000 to Rs 7500 has been reduced from 18 percent to 12 percent. Hotel rooms above Rs 7500 will attract GST of 18 percent instead of 28 percent.
The GST rate on outdoor catering up to Rs 7501 has been reduced to 5 percent with ITC from the current 18 percent with ITC. GST rate on outdoor catering above Rs 7501 will remain at 18 percent, GST on diamond job work has been reduced from 5 percent to 1.5 percent and GST on machine job supply has been reduced from 18 percent to 12 percent.
He further informed about the decision of the central government to exempt food items that can be stored, such as pulses, rice, tea, coffee, nuts, spices etc. To encourage eco-friendly vehicles, GST rate on electric vehicles has been reduced from 12 percent to 5 percent and on vehicle chargers and charging points has also been reduced from 18 percent to 5 percent.
He also said that the filling of new return system will be introduced from April 2020 (earlier proposed from October, 2019) in order to give ample opportunity to taxpayers as well as the system to adapt accordingly.
Annual return form GSTR 9A for composition taxpayers for the tax period 2017-18 and 2018-19 has been waived off and annual return form GSTR 9 for the taxpayers having aggregate turnover up to Rs 2 crores made optional for the tax period 2017-18 and 2018-19.
Mein also highlighted the benefits of implementing GST in the state, saying that “its introduction in the state of Arunachal Pradesh has been a positive revenue event for the state.”
“There is a growth in revenue collection in the state since implementation of the GST and the state has registered an exponential growth in the number of registered dealers,” Mein said.
He informed that the collection for Financial Year 2018-19 from GST was 569.41 crore, which has witnessed “almost 111 percent growth in comparison with nine months of previous Financial Year.”
Arunachal Pradesh is one of the few states to record positive growth since implementation of GST and the state topped the list in the North Eastern states with collection of Rs 304.74 crore in the current Financial Year 2019-20 (April-August), Mein informed.
He urged upon the state executives of the BJP to strengthen the hands of the prime minister in realizing his vision of a “New India.”
In his key note address, State President & Member of Parliament Tapir Gao impressed upon party workers and leaders to fulfil the promises made to the people and satisfy their aspirations.
On the occasion, state BJP vice president Dominic Tadar made a presentation on the membership drive of the BJP. He announced that the state BJP unit has now added 1, 68, 452 new primary members. This has now increased the primary membership of the BJP to 3, 67,587 and active members to 9085, making BJP the largest party in the state.
During the meeting, BJP Arunachal Pradesh also felicitated some party members for their exemplary activities using the ModiApp.
