N-E: Govt cracks whip on officers

The timing couldn8217;t have been more appropriate. With the mess in Manipur dominating its agenda, the Manmohan Singh government has asked...

The timing couldn8217;t have been more appropriate. With the mess in Manipur dominating its agenda, the Manmohan Singh government has asked Secretaries of all departments to take the North-East more seriously, make 8216;8216;effective visits8217;8217; to the region, prepare detailed 8216;8216;visit reports,8217;8217; apprise the Prime Minister of the pace of development and suggest ways to accelerate it.

This message went out in a letter dated August 6, a copy of which is with The Indian Express, sent by Cabinet Secretary B K Chaturvedi to all Secretaries heading various Ministries and departments.

Drawing their attention to two previous notes sent during the NDA rule8212;in November 2002 and April 20038212;Chaturvedi minces few words: 8216;8216;A perusal of some of the recent 8216;visit notes8217; reveals that these notes do not adequately convey the essence of our efforts, nor do they highlight the specific areas of concern. Most often, the 8216;visit notes8217; are written perfunctorily and therefore, do not serve the intended purpose.8217;8217;

What is needed, instead, writes Chaturvedi, is that the N-E region gets 8216;8216;sustained attention in matters of security and development and also for demonstrating to the people of the region the importance of the area in the overall scheme of governance.8217;8217;

8216;8216;The PM has to be periodically apprised,8217;8217; the letter continues, 8216;8216;of the pace of our developmental efforts in the region as well as our efforts in integrating the process of development in the North East with the rest of the country.8217;8217;

nbsp;	8216;We wait and watch8217;

		nbsp;	8226; Centre for 8216;8216;wait and watch8217;8217; approach towards Manipur till August 15. 8226; Cabinet Committee on Security meet, slated for Friday, called off 8226; Army Chief General N C Vij briefed PM on Army8217;s view to AFSPA withdrawal	nbsp;

That the North East does suffer from lower than national averages in various economic indicators is a fact well-known. Take for instance total capital expenditure in all the North-Eastern states as against the total expenditure incurred by the Centre for the whole country: capital expenditure in the North East during 1998-99 was a paltry Rs 89.3 crore, it dipped to Rs 79.9 crore in the following year and by 2003-04 it was Rs 1,689 crore. In families Below the Poverty Line BPL and against a national average of 29.6 per cent, except for Manipur and Mizoram, all the other states are worse off.

Even school drop-out rates are much higher in the North-East than the national average of 54.65 per cent. Meghalaya is the highest at 77 per cent while Manipur is the lowest at 37.75 per cent.