Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, December 30 2009:
Along with approving the District Council Election Rules, a meeting of the SPF Cabinet held today resolved to conduct Autonomous District Council elections by April 2010 .
A Cabinet Minister in the SPF Government said that the newly formulated election rules were given the nod during the Cabinet presided by Chief Minister Okram Ibobi.
The District Council elections would be conducted by the State Election Commission.
The meeting decided to complete all poll processes by March next year or April at
the latest.
It also agreed on proposing annual plan size of 2010-11 with an increment of 30 per cent from the previous year's plan size at Rs 3232 crores.
The plan amount of the current fiscal is Rs 2000 crores.
Out of this, Rs 500 crores are for Special Plan Assistance.
The proposed plan amount of Rs 3232 crores for the next fiscal includes Rs 800 crores for SPA.
Notably, Chief Minister O Ibobi and the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission are scheduled to meet on January 31 at New Delhi to finalise the annual plan size of the State.
The Cabinet also agreed on allowing SC/ST/women/disabled persons within the annual income group of Rs 50,000 to take free legal aid from the State Legal Service Authority.
Earlier, only those within the annual income group of Rs 25,000 were entitled to free legal assistance.
The meeting further resolved to add 13 different points in the contract regarding Integrated Disease Surveillance being run by the State Health Dept with central funding, five points in Social Welfare and another five points regarding Manipur State Kala Akademi under Art and Culture Dept.