GUWAHATI, 9 Oct: Arunachal Pradesh Governor BD Mishra on Sunday highlighted the challenges before the state government and suggested “a way forward in implementation of welfare measures and projects.”
Addressing the 70th plenary of the North Eastern Council (NEC) here in Assam, the governor emphasised that the NEC “must keep its guidelines adaptable enough to adapt to the changing needs of the region.”
“Important sectors like sports, water resources, and flood management should receive adequate attention, in addition to sectors like power, roads, school education, etc. While allocating the resources, due consideration should be given to the expanse of the state’s geographical area, its remoteness, and the present status of development,” he said.
Advocating adopting innovative methods of monitoring and evaluating the developmental projects “to ensure that the funds are optimally utilised to achieve its objective,” Mishra proposed creation of a dashboard by the NEC, in association with the state’s planning department, for real-time monitoring of the uploaded NEC projects.
“There is a need to increase the allocation to NEC in a phased manner,” he said, and requested the DoNER and the NEC to “support the developmental needs of Arunachal Pradesh by ensuring that the resources allocated match the financial requirements to bridge the huge developmental gap of the state.”
While financial resources are an important area, the other major area to work on is developing the absorption capacity of the states in the region by training and handholding, he said. “There is a huge scope for development of the entire Northeastern region, which can be achieved with the support of the NEC by becoming the think tank of the Northeastern region,” he said.
Stating that the NEC could emerge as “the NITI Aayog of the Northeast” by providing guidance and assistance to the states, he suggested that the NEC start preparing a roadmap for the region up to 2047, “in a ten-year rolling manner, and present the same during the next plenary meeting.”
Informing that the Arunachal government used the Covid-19 pandemic period to rejuvenate the health sector by converging resources from all sources, and reduced the human resource gap in the health sector from 33 percent to 6 percent, he proposed that the NEC and the DoNER consider supporting the lone medical college of the state, the TRIHMS, “not only for capital expenditure but for revenue expenditure also.”
For a fund-constrained state like Arunachal, it is becoming difficult day by day to provide resources for the tertiary healthcare sector as the state is investing in primary and secondary health sectors, he said.
Highlighting border area development, the governor informed that the Arunachal government has launched the “Golden Jubilee Border Village Illumination Programme, with a mission to construct 50 micro-hydel projects in remote border villages to provide continuous electricity to the villagers, as also the armed forces.”
A comprehensive proposal for development of border areas within 50 kilometres from the LAC is under active consideration of the government of India, he informed.
Mishra apprised the council of the initiatives taken up under the leadership of Chief Minister Pema Khandu in various sectors, including counter-insurgency, police modernisation, border area development, health, education, preservation of cultural heritage, climate resilience, reforms in governance, skill development, and entrepreneurship promotion.
“Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s doctrine of Atmanirbhar Bharat, Arunachal Pradesh has taken up a number of commendable initiatives towards self-sufficiency.
“The state has launched its own atmanirbhar schemes that will empower the people of rural Arunachal Pradesh. We have also made good progress in startup and entrepreneurship development sectors that have already started bearing fruits,” the governor said. (Raj Bhavan)
