Assam Governor Prof. Jagdish Mukhi visits Kokrajhar, holds public durbar

KOKRAJHAR: Close on the heels of announcing public durbar for immediate redresaal of people's problems, Assam Governor Prof. Jagadish Mukhi held a public durbar in the BTC Secretariat on Monday where he heard public grievances and asked administrative functionaries for their immediate redressal.

In his second visit to Kokrajhar after taking over the BTC administration, the Governor

heard the problems of people coming from different walks of life, including

representatives of social, cultural, religious, political, linguistic and student

organizations, and directed BTC Administrator Rajesh Prasad to take steps for their immediate redressal.

The Governor, immediately after taking over the reins of the administration of BTC, took special initiatives like holding public durbar in BTC areas. He ordered all the DCs in four

BTC districts and SDO (C) to hold public durbur in their respective jurisdiction andto take steps for solving the problems. He asked the administration to initiate every effort to ensure citizen-friendly governance in the BTC by listening to the citizens and taking responsive approach for citizen-responsive governance. Moreover, time-bound governance with time line for each activity has to be ensured with decisiveness and resoluteness in action, the Governor added.

Moreover, the terms of Village Council Development Committee (VCDC),

Central Selection Board (CSB) and Territorial Constituency Level Co-ordination

Committee (TCLCC) are co-terminus and automatically get dissolved with the end

of the term of the council. The Governor has received several grievances regarding

the misappropriation of the job cards issued under MGNREGA. He said that the people living within the jurisdictions of VCDC should not suffer and therefore, asked the Administrator to designate the respective BDOs to take care of people's welfare, that was primarily looked after by the VCDCs. The Governor pointed out that as per the rules, the job cards should remain in the hands of the beneficiaries and asked the Administrator to get hold of all the job cards from the VCDC functionaries and hand over the same to them within a week. Further, 4 out of 9 Municipal Boards whose term was over were dissolved and their functions will be looked after by the executive officers.

The Governor asked the Kokrajhar Deputy Commissioner to prepare a list of all the migrant workers in his district and map their skills sets to employ them in different vocations. He also asked the Administrator to allot the job cards to the migrant workers who had come back to different districts of BTC areas post the COVID-19 induced lockdown. During his day-long stay in Kokrajhar, Assam Governor Mukhi made a visit to the Municipal market and hailed the efforts of the Administrator and the Principal Secretary who, under the direction of the Governor, initiated the 'I love Kokrajhar' campaign and shifted the roadside vendors of Kokrajhar main bazar to the three-storey building of bi-weekly bazar of Kokrajhar town. The building was made under Non Lapsable Central Pool of Resources (NLCPR) scheme with 90 per cent central funding. This effort by the Administrator and the executive officer of Kokrajhar Municipal Board (KMB) enabled the roadside vendors to have a permanent place to sell their produce there by reducing greatly the congestion and unhygienic conditions in the heart of Kokrajhar town.

Because of the rampant tree felling, the Governor has put a blanket ban on any kind of tree cutting and started a massive plantation drive in BTC under the project 'Hariyali' where 40 lakh plants, inclusive of flowering, fruiting, medicinal and other plant varieties, are to be planted. Under Hariyali project, so far altogether 12,92,727 saplings have been planted in BTC, including 9,65,568 in Kokrajhar. In line with that, the Governor planted saplings in Bodoland University (BU) on Monday. Around 478 saplings were planted on Monday in presence of the Governor.

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