UG activities extensively controlled: Governor
Source: Hueiyen News Service

Imphal, February 25 2015: The 10th session of the Tenth Manipur Legislative Assembly began Wednesday with the Governor in his address stating that the activities of Underground Groups (UGs) in the State have been restrained and curbed to a 'large extent' .

Governor Dr KK Paul in his address said the Manipur Police has been able to keep the law and order situation under control and maintain public order despite working in an extremely sensitive security environment.

He said the State police force has also been able to achieve commendable results on the counter-insurgency front confronting various problems, which are both complicated and serious in nature, compounded by the shortage of manpower, infrastructural and other logistic constraints.

The Governor said the Manipur Police with the help of the Army/Central Para-military Forces (CPMF)/Assam Rifles (AR) has been able to curb the activities of the UGs.

Governor KK Paul and Chief Minister O Ibobi at the Manipur Legislative Assembly

Dr KK Paul informed that in the hill districts, the area domination by SF/Police compelled the UG elements, especially the valley based armed outfits, to seek refuge in the neighbouring countries like Myanmar and Bangladesh apart from taking shelter in other States of the country.

The Governor said a total of 98 cadres of different UG groups surrendered at individual level to the State and the Central forces during the year 2014 under the Surrender Scheme of MHA.

The cadres are in the process of rehabilitation with assistance of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), the Army and the Assam Rifles, Dr Paul informed.

Meanwhile, dwelling on the issues of Tribal Affairs and Hills, the Governor stated that an amount of Rs 259.31 crore has been provided in the year 2014-15 for the implementation of various development schemes for assisting 3497 families of Scheduled Tribes (STs) and 200 families of Scheduled Castes (SCs) under various income generating programmes.

For facilitating safe, sound and affordable accommodations to the tribal girl students, eight girls hostels are under construction, he informed.

Dr Paul pointed out that the Tribal Affairs & Hills Department has also taken up construction of seven Tribal Markets at different places in the hill areas of Manipur for providing tribal farmers a centre for selling their agricultural produce and other marketable items.

On education sector, the Governor said his Government continues to give thrust to school education by providing access to affordable quality school education to all children of school-going age group of the State.

He said in order to bring about an equitable distribution of posts and teachers to each school during 2014-15, a massive exercise of re-location of 2,050 existing posts of different categories involving transfer and posting of 1,495 teachers to schools where there were shortage of teaching staff was taken up as part of the process of rationalisation exercise.

In order to check drop-out of students, 58 Junior High Schools have been upgraded to the status of High Schools, besides a decision has also been taken to upgrade 11 High Schools to Higher Secondary Schools especially in backward and remote educational blocks of the State with creation of adequate number of posts teaching staffs, said the Governor.

In order to make up the shortage of teaching faculty in Government colleges, the State Government has taken up measures to recruit 285 posts of Assistant Professor in various subjects as per the latest University Grants Commission (UGC) regulations for educational qualification of College Teachers through Manipur Public Service Commission (MPSC), he added.

On the power sector, the Governor informed that 2x12.5 MVA, 132/33 KV Sub-Stations at Hundung and Chandel are being commissioned in March this year and with this all the nine districts of the State will be covered under the 132 KV system network.

To provide reliable and good quality power to every nook and corner of the State 2x20 MVA, 132/33 Sub-Stations are also being taken up in Moreh and Thanlon under NLCPR funding, he said.

The Governor said the power demand of Manipur in 2019-2020 is estimated at 528 MW and the present 132 KV transmission system may not be sufficient to handle such a huge load and hence a 3x105 MVA, 400/132 KV Sub-Station is being taken up at strategic load centre at Thoubal in Thoubal district.

With regard to tourism, Dr Paul said in order to utilise the tourist infrastructures created by the State Government optimally, process of leasing out the tourism facilities under Public-Private Partnership (PPP) with a view to make them functional and tourist worthy is being put into place.