LS Speaker Sumitra Mahajan to open NERCPA conference
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, June 14 2017:
The 16th North East Region Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (NERCPA) conference will be held under the theme "North East and Look East Policy" and will be inaugurated by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan tomorrow at the Assembly premises.
It will go on till June 18 .
Speaker of the State Assembly, Yumnam Khemchand will deliver the welcome address and the keynote address will be delivered by Speaker of Meghalaya Legislative Assembly and Chairman, NERCPA, Abu Taher Mondal tomorrow.
Deputy Chief Minister, Y Joykumar Singh will also address the inaugural session.
On the second day of the conference.
Governor Dr Najma Heptulla will address the delegates.
The presiding officers and members of the legislatures of North East States will be participating in this special conference which will deliberate on three significant subjects : (i) North East and Look East Policy; (ii) Special plan for development of Railways, Airways, Surface Road and Inland Waterways connectivity for speedy economic development of North East Region and (iii) Discussion on the setting up of a Chapter of Speaker's Research Initiative (SRI) in the North Eastern Region for capacity building of the legislators of the region and generating research for the North Eastern Legislatures.
The North Eastern Region because of its typical geographic location, lack of connectivity and several other such constraints has for several decades lagged behind in various developmental activities.
Because of these impediments, the NE States follow a typical region specific governance and development model.
As the development delivery system is fraught with several problems and difficulties, the legislators of the North Eastern Region States face the daunting task of complying with their oversight law making and financial control responsibility.
The members of these legislatures, predictably, require a very high level of skills to understand the specialized requirements of their respective States and people while discharging their duties.
The North Eastern States' legislatures have thus, for a very long time, felt the need of having a credible mechanism for providing authentic and analytical information for the effective functioning of the legislators.
The Speaker's Research Initiative (SRI) was institutionalized on July 23, 2015 with the objective to generate high quality research inputs on strategic and topical issues, and to device appropriate mechanism for interaction with members of both the Houses of Parliament for the purpose of information dissemination and capacity building.
To achieve this objective, SRI envisioned evolving participative modules for faster and effective information dissemination amongst the members.
SRI, during its short existence, has worked proactively for achieving its noble objectives under the dynamic leadership and guidance of Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan.
Several meetings and workshops with various stakeholders of democracy and eminent domain experts have been conducted for the Members of Parliament during sessions, specifically on subjects listed before the Parliament.
The members of both the Houses from NE region have immensely benefited from the varied activities of SRI.
Recognizing the importance of North East Region in the holistic development of the country and at the request of the Speakers of State Legislative Assemblies of the North Eastern Legislative Assemblies, the Lok Sabha Speaker has agreed to set up a chapter of SRI in the North Eastern region to provide research inputs to the legislators before each State Assembly of North East can institutionalize its own research initiatives.
This conference will discuss logistics relating to setting up of SRI Chapter in the North East.
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