[Assam] Lack of experts hits DoNER projects

Tue Mar 14 06:52:07 PST 2006

Lack of experts hits DoNER projects
>From Our Staff Correspondent
 NEW DELHI, March 13  Ministry Development of North-Eastern Region (DoNER) has albeit candidly, conceded that lack of in-house technical expertise has hampered in vetting Detailed Project Reports (DPRs). In a Rajya Sabha reply to a question by Syeda Anowara Taimur, Minister of DoNER PR Kyndiah denying that his Ministry has failed to cope with the pressure to examine the DPRs, said that they were examined by the Ministry in consultation with the expertise available in the concerned Ministries of Government of India.

There is no technical manpower in the DoNER. The Ministry has moved a proposal for creation of a small unit of Technical Cell comprising one Superintendent Engineer, two Executive Engineers, four assistant Executive Engineers, three personal assistants, one upper Division clerk and two peons. The proposal has not been cleared by the Ministry of Finance as of now, Kyndiah said. 

Significantly, an example of the absence of the technical manpower was the up grade of Imphal-based Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS). The Project has suffered because of delays in preparation and processing of the DPR. The Project was cleared under the Prime Ministers package.

The Planning Commission had convened a meeting and it was agreed that a comprehensive DPR be prepared. The Commission has since accorded in principle approval in February, Kyndiah said. 

Meanwhile, the Minister claimed that 759 projects at an approved cost of Rs. 5,096.98 crore have been sanctioned up to February under Non Lapsable Central Pool of Resources (NLCPR) for the North Eastern Region. Out of total 759 projects 234 projects have been sanctioned for Asom, the Minister said.

Meanwhile, the Ministrys response to the demand to channelise funds to the North Eastern Council (NEC) exclusively for wood and bamboo based industries has been lukewarm.

The Federation of North Eastern Wood Based Industries had petitioned the Ministry to earmark Rs 300 crore for the NEC. They also called for extension of certain benefits like provision of funds for machineries for conversion of bamboo into wood, working capital.

The Minister said that generally, fund was not allocated to the NEC under its annual plans for specific schemes. The NEC has, however, supported a few industrial units for substituting wood by bamboo.

---------------------------------
Yahoo! Mail
Bring photos to life! New PhotoMail  makes sharing a breeze. 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.assamnet.org/pipermail/assam-assamnet.org/attachments/20060314/cb929cd5/attachment.htm>