EMN
Dimapur, April 16
Governor of Nagaland, Assam and Tripura, PB Acharya said that the Non-Lapsable accumulated funds of the NEC are nearly Rs. 12,000 crore and needed to be worked-out on how best it can be utilized for the development of the Northeastern states. Addressing the two-day 64th Meeting of North East Council (NEC) from April 9 at New Delhi, Govenor said, NEC has been sanctioning about Rs.100 crore per year per State which is too inadequate and our focus should mainly be on infrastructure, electricity and education.
Development is possible only when there is a good road connectivity, he said.
He also specially highlighted the importance of proper implementation of the Swachh Bharat Mission initiatives, so as to make the State clean, which will go a long way in boosting tourism, improving the health of the people and contributing to the development of the State.
Regarding Jan Dhan Yojana, Governor said that unless down trodden people get empowered, the society will not get empowered. Minimum 5 persons must be got enrolled in Jan Dhan Yojana by the Universities/Colleges, etc.
Governor also proposed adoption of villages by Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs), Universities and Colleges by providing various amenities to them under the Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives.
NER underdeveloped is India underdeveloped. Hence, the developmental gaps of NER which have been an issue for a long time should be tackled and addressed along appropriate strategies and policies.
NER, has more than 5000 km of international border. It is thus imperative to put a productive strategy into place to reap gains from International Trade and Border trade.
There is urgent need to reorient the strategy and policy for NER according to the Region’s endowment.
“Higher education today in India has four challenges in terms of four Es. These are Expansion, Equity, Excellence and Employability. We need to reach the unreached and include the excluded in a continuous sustained manner. We have to improve Excellence, put more money into research, to get much more done in that. And the fourth E, which we don't talk about enough, is Employability. We need to make sure that people actually can come out of the education system, that the economy needs and that the employer needs.”
“Universities should start continuous interaction with trade, industry & commerce of our areas and address the availability of nature given raw materials/wealth to create more wealth to make use of them by introducing supplementary courses taking into account the law of supply and demand.
Regional Education Institutes in NER should be established and upgraded to impart quality education. Moreover, Facilities of Skill/vocational educational institutes should be upgraded and strengthened for the unemployed youth of the region.”
The Govenor stressed the need for supplementing our present curriculum with some purposeful skill to the youth and implement credit framework for skills and choice based credit system in Universities and Colleges.
He said, there is an urgent need for the Educational Institutions, specially the Universities, for adopting the villages and get the statistics of basic amenities etc in remote, backward and underdeveloped areas.
On the third day of the NEC meeting on April 11, a mega North East Songs & Dance festival was held at Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium, New Delhi, which was inaugurated by President of India.
It was sponsored by the NEC and DoNER and organized by Meghalaya. It shall be held by rotation in different parts of the country, where one of the 8 States of North East will be the organizing State.
Governor suggested that there should be an independent empowered Committee to be constituted by DoNER with representation from both North Eastern States and other parts of the country, so that the organization of these cultural programmes can be organized in a more holistic manner.
