Exercising special powers conferred under the Art 244(1) of the Constitution, Governor Draupadi Murmu on Tuesday invited all the elected representatives of the Jharkhand Assembly to discuss development related matters in the scheduled areas of the State, to seek suggestions and evolve a roadmap for progress of those areas which are often tagged as the neglected part of the State.
The meeting was attended by Chief Minister Raghubar Das, Health Minister Ram Chandra Chandravanshi, Urban Development Minister CP Singh, Welfare Minister louis Marandi, elected representatives of the ruling party and other political parties. The meeting was chaired by the Governor.
“Suggestions would be sought from elected MPs, principal secretaries and secretaries of the department besides, social workers and scribes so that the State progresses forward and people residing in Scheduled Area also progress as per the expectations. I submit reports on scheduled area to the President Secretariat, hence suggestions with regard to the problems of the Scheduled Area are being sought from all,” said the Governor.
The first of its kind meeting attended by all the elected representatives cutting across political boundaries focused on two issues of significance for the Fifth Schedule Areas of Jharkhand which included displacements caused by various projects, impact of welfare schemes, and seeking workable solution to remove impediments to growth. The governor invited suggestions in a candid discussion on the serious topic that holds the key to development.
The Chief Minister highlighted the bottlenecks in providing succor to the displaced of projects that have been undertaken in those areas and also communicated his government’s efforts in addressing challenges on the front of health, education and importantly, efforts made by the State government on facilitating loans on land documents.
“Displacement and rehabilitation are major issues for the State. It is also seen that differences within the family stalls most of the compensation related matter,” said Das, adding “department of Social Welfare would provide information to all the MlAs so that they can apprise people in a better manner.”
The Governor was suggested a host of measures to address some of the basic issues that pose a problem to the execution of people centric project. Weeding out ill founded social practices and mitigating its impact through better education were some of the points that the Governor was suggested during the meeting.
“I suggested that anti-addiction drive should be run in the Fifth Schedule Areas and to start a drive to end superstitions prevalent in those areas. People of those areas must be made literate as literacy opens the road to development,” said the Minister.
land issues and hurdles in the rehabilitation of displaced in the Fifth Schedule Areas was tabled for discussion as the Governor reportedly raised the point with the people’s representative at the meeting held in Raj Bhawan. Incidentally, issue of entitlement of land and demarcation of properties were some of the issues which the Governor was apprised of during the meeting and suggestions of bringing land records from Bihar cropped up to end the plight of Adivasis of Jharkhand.
“When being asked, I informed the Governor that we should bring maps from Bihar and create land record so as to identify who are the owners of a piece of land. lots of cases are filed in court over land disputes and they stretch for a very long time,” maintained Singh.
The Social Welfare Minister maintained preplanning budget process is being adopted to speed up growth and whatever suggestions that could resolve issues of the State should be presented in a written format so that budgetary provisions can be made for those suggestions.
Apart from BJP MlAs, the meeting was also attended by Bahragora MlA Kunal Sarangi and Jarmundi MlA Badal Patrlekh.