Source: Hueiyen News Service
New Delhi, December 19 2010:
Lamenting that the Centre has not fulfilled the long-pending demand of the state to enhance its fuel storage capacity, Manipur Chief Minister O Ibobi Singh today said had the delay taken place in states like West Bengal or Maharashtra the situation could have turned violent.
"It is an eight-year-old demand to increase the fuel storage capacity of the state...The present storage capacity is very less and people face problem when fuel supplies run out," Singh said at the plenary session of AICC here.
He said had the delay taken place in a state like Maharashtra or West Bengal, "the states could have burnt" .
Ibobi claimed that despite the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) being allocated with land to set up a bigger depot so that the storage capacity could be increased to three months from the present 13 days, no action has been
taken so far.
Earlier this year, the Naga Students' Federation had enforced a blockade of National Highway 39 running into several days to protest elections to Autonomous District Councils in Manipur hills and Manipur government's decision to ban entry of NSCN leader Th Muivah to the state.
The blockade chocked essential supplies to Manipur.
Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, voicing concern over spiralling extremist violence, said while such elements need to be combated, the doors for dialogue must remain open and the prospect of "political accommodation" should be kept alive.
She also made it clear that the efforts of forces operating from across the border to spread terror in the country would be fought with determination including in Jammu and Kashmir, where the government has appointed interlocutors to give "new energy and focus" to the political process.
"We are confronted with terrorist groups in Jammu and Kashmir.
In a number of states, Naxalites are using violent methods to undermine the basis of the democratic system.
In parts of northeast, militant groups disturb peace," the Congress President said addressing the party plenary in Burari here.