People's Democracy

 TRIPURA

Left Front Government Announces 33-Point Package

FURTHER bringing in sharp relief the distinction between the pro-capitalist policies of the country’s ruling classes and the pro-people predilection of the Left Front government in Tripura, the state’s chief minister Manik Sarkar launched on December 3 a 33-point package for the welfare and development of the scheduled castes and other backward communities as well as religious minorities.

Held at the packed auditorium of Rabindra Shatabarshiki Bhavan at state capital Agartala, the announcement and formal inauguration of the package came in the wake of about 98 per cent implementation of the 44-point package for the same sections of the people, that was announced on January 27, 2000. The same timeframe of three years has been set for the implementation of the new 33-point package too, with 15 points earmarked for the scheduled castes, 10 points for the OBC, and eight points for the religious minorities.

The highlights of the new package are residential schools, hostels, higher education loans, assistance for pursuing higher studies outside the state, steps for promoting rubber, tea and coffee cultivation, assistance for house building, leather craftsmen’s community development centres, digging ponds for pisciculture, laying of orchards, and assistance to washermen’s families. The package also continues the earlier commenced drives for land allotment, women’s empowerment and special area-wise development, etc, that were included in the earlier package.

Explaining the purpose of the package, the chief minister said it was meant for making Tripura a model of development based on the own resources of the state. He then added that it is the adoption and serious implementation of development programmes by the Left Front government that has placed Tripura among the three front ranking states of the north east. He also pointed out that such packages are the product of the pre-eminently democratic ethos of the state, which stresses on sailing in the same boat instead of stealing a march over others on the basis of race and religion.

In his address, scheduled caste welfare cum information minister Anil Sarkar said that this package was a part of the Left Front government’s ceaseless process of bringing the backward sections of society on a par with others through the overall development activities going on in the state. The package is also meant for energising the endeavour and enthusiasm among the sections concerned, he maintained. Commerce and industries minister Pabitra Kar pointed out that the Left Front government’s packages have been carrying specific time-bound targets that are to be reached by the state alongside other ongoing development projects. Labour and religious minorities minister Faizur also spoke on the occasion.

Incidentally, a 37-point package for welfare and development of the state’s scheduled tribes is already under way for economic uplift of the tribals through agriculture, cottage industries and agriculture related sectors. This particular package has been over and above the ongoing programmes for all round development of the state. The packages aim at prioritising the well being of certain sections of society, as also specifying the sectors for activities like education, agriculture, horticulture, land allotment and infrastructure development, with a view to synchronising the momentum of growth statewide. The successes achieved in this respect over the last three years are due to the seriousness and sincerity of the implementers of such programmes, as also the ceaseless supervision of the administration as well as the people. (INN)