Dilip,
Go the whole hog and liberate before anything else can ever happen for the
Assamese:
See how things go:
Brahmaputra Board ACT1980 Tripura ,Mizoram,Assam equal Voice>> Phooshhhhhh
National Embankments Policy since 1955>> More and more Inundation>>Phooshhhhhh
2004 Mother of all Floods: MMS Declares Task Force:Texan Expertize>>Phooshhhhhh
2004 I suggest Brahmaputra Valley Authority Autonomous--'I will start as
head'.Promptly MMS comes back with his NorthEast Water Authority>>Phooshhhhhh
2005 Big Bally-Hoo SAARC Car Ralley from Assam to Indonesia
'LookEast'Phooshhhhhh
2005>MMS Co want to Talk('all subjects') .3rd Round"We
shallrelease..Phooshhhhhh
2007 Total Disaster-Tarun Declares"Now on We will have our own Task force to
TackleFloods and Banks Collapse And Centre willguide us all the way"
Phooshhhhhh
2007Sept~ 300 Bridges //washed away(all DelhiDesigned/Approved/lent).This apart
from the big floods induced by "ABV'S dreamprojectEast-West 4lane Expressway"in
Northbank-fully blocking the natural flow from Hills to Luit. Assam PWD Chief
asksfor 100Cr for emergency restoration. I send word "Hang Delhi's India Road
Congress Designs-Go for anybody's designswith performance Guarantee-at lowest
Price"-that will bring jobs for meaningless Assam Engineer BE's-Word came
Back-No Delhi code-no Bridge. And Design Calculation must be submitted and
Approved : Delhi?Phooshhhhhh
MM
Date: Sat, 15 Sep 2007 12:30:01 -0700From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]: [EMAIL
PROTECTED]: [Assam] Devolution of Power
There are two topics below. They may seem unrelated at first glance. If you
read deeper, you will see the relation that it is the government officials who
want to hold on to their power and thereby do not empower the citizens who are
quite capable of handling some of the functions currently being handled in
Dispur or New Delhi.
Dilip Deka
====================================================
>From the Sentinel
Panchayats on PaperOne of the most vital prerequisites of a healthy democracy
is the devolution of power right down to the grassroots level. Unless there is
empowerment of people down to the lowest level of the administrative set-up, we
can have democracy only on paper. What is central to the idea of democracy,
therefore, is that there has to be complete decentralization of all subjects
except a few vital ones like currency, defence, foreign relations, immigration
and so on for democracy to mean anything for the people who ought to be at the
centre of things. But even 60 years after Independence, there is a very strong
vested interest that insists on not delegating to the panchayats even the
powers that were committed to them. This is because a large section of the
political executive and the bureaucracy feel that if the State government were
to give away to the panchayats even half the powers committed to them, they
would be bereft of all power and would cease to matter to the people any more.
This is the very opposite mental attitude to the one that believes that the
state should wither away if there is good governance. It is also militates
against the concept of a good teacher who should have no regrets about becoming
redundant after he/she has inspired the student to be an avid learner.
Devolution of power to the panchayats also means a considerable loss of income
from bribes in the corridors of power. Be that as it may, the Asom Government’s
reluctance to hand over power to the panchayats constitutes a serious breach of
promise. This is particularly significant considering that the Tarun Gogoi
government has always been particularly vocal about the devolution of power to
the grassroots level. This should be all too evident from the item on Efforts
to Revitalize the Rural Infrastructure on page 10 of the Congress manifesto
which says (this is a free translation from the Assamese) that according to
promises made, the party has established three-tiered panchayat elections and
involved the panchayats in the development process and the entire
responsibility for development, with 29 subjects, has been given to panchayats.
In actual fact, this has not happened because the State government is quite
unwilling to part with all the powers to panchayats. Things have come to such a
pass that though the government has set up a cabinet sub-committee under Dr
Bhumidhar Barman to ensure the devolution of powers to panchayats in respect of
these 29 subjects, the committee seems quite unwilling to expedite the
devolution of power to panchayats. In other words, the formation of the cabinet
sub-committee would seem to be no more than a charade for public consumption.
And even though the State government prepared the ‘activity mapping’ under
pressure from the Union Minister for Panchayats and Rural Development, Mr Mani
Shankar Aiyar, there has been virtually no devolution of powers to panchayats
so far. The choice for Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi is obviously very clear. He
can turn our State into what looks exactly like a banana republic by keeping
all political power with his cabinet, or he can opt for a real democracy by
sincerely empowering panchayats.
No Locals for NE TradeLately, the Union Government has begun to bend over
backwards in promoting trade between India’s Northeast and countries like
Bangkok. In March this year, DONER Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar led a delegation
of businessmen from the Northeast to Thailand. This was reciprocated by the
Thai Commerce Minister leading two high-level delegations to India, one to
attend the 3rd Northeast Business Summit in New Delhi and another subsequently
to the Northeast. It is in the fitness of things, therefore, that a Northeast
Investment Week is being planned to begin in Bangkok on October 2, 2007. While
all this is very well, what the people of the Northeast would like to know is
why entrepreneurs of the Northeast should always be denied the trade already
being generated as a result of such exchanges — in the form of air travel,
arrangement of accommodation in Bangkok etc. We know for a fact that local
travel agents had made a bid for the air travel bookings and for the
arrangements for hotel bookings in Bangkok. Those who have travelled abroad
extensively with local travel agents handling all their travel arrangements
will vouch that they provide as good service as any travel agent in the
metropolitan cities of India. The crucial question is: why should the
organizers of such meets create a vested interest which is hell-bent on denying
all opportunities to local entrepreneurs? How is it going to look for DONER and
the Union Government if someone decides to tell the Thai counterparts that
entrepreneurs of the Northeast are regarded as such outcasts that even the
travel arrangements had to be entrusted to a Kolkata firm? The next question to
follow should be: Are you planning to do business with a group of businessmen
who are considered by their own government as being quite incompetent even to
make the travel arrangements for this trip? The answers should be very edifying
indeed.
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