<p>Judgment of the Supreme Court in the matter of Tapas Guha & Others Vs Union of India & Others dated 06/05/2024.</p> <p>The Ministry of Civil Aviation of the Union Government decided to build
Urging the people from the cross-sections of the society not to ponder much over what the Northeast region got and what it did not from the recently announced General Budget, Prof Dr Madhurjya Bezbaruah of Gauhati University instead said that the focal point should now be to keep a close eye on the implementation aspect, which would eventually determine the growth of the country as a whole and the Northeast in particular. Calling the General Budget as an election Budget, Dr Bezbaruah stressed on the need for an inclusive growth by bridging the gap between the haves and the have-nots, which is one of the biggest challenges before the 11th Five Year Plan. Dr Bezbaruah was speaking during a discussion on the recently announced General and Railway Budgets, which was organised under the aegis of the All Assam Students' Union and the Asom Unnati Sabha. The Northeast, especially Assam, in recent times, has witnessed a phase where a series of development schemes has been initiated, but when it comes to the implementation of the schemes, there has always been a question mark. "A proper implementation monitoring system is what we need at this moment,' he pointed out. He also rued over the fact that unlike some of the other educational institutes of the country, some of the oldest and premier educational institutes of the State like the Cotton College and the Gauhati University had failed to draw the attention of the Union Finance Minister, which is a matter of concern. Dr Bezbaruah also took an exception to the Union Finance Minister's decision to waive off loans of the farmers, stating that it might well destroy the rural loan market. "The Government can help the cause of farmers by encouraging bank and institutional loan system,' he pointed out. RS Joshi, director, FINER, while echoing the concerns of Bezbaruah, further said that political aspirations have overtaken the recently announced General Budget. He, while mentioning that the allocation for the North East in the Budget has remained more and less stagnant, further called for giving stress on the service sector which contributes heavily to the country's economy. "Though the country's overall GDP growth is 8.7 per cent, the north-eastern States' growth rate is however lagging behind,' Joshi stated, adding, "The North East has to be in the scheme of things of the Union Government if the regional imbalances in the country are to be bridged.' S Borborah of Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati, while stressing the need for expediting infrastructure development, said, "More than allocation, evaluation and monitoring of various projects is what can produce greater dividends.'
The implementation of the Supplementary Nutritional Programme (SNP) in Assam is "tardy and failure.' It is handicapped by long spells of non-feeding days, inequality in and manipulation of the allotment for nutrition, diversion of the allotment without compensatory replacement and incurring of excess expenditure,' according to a report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India (CAG). The report, tabled in the Assembly on Monday, showed that the Assam government did not provide funds for the SNP during the financial years between 2002-03 and 2004-05. The additional Central assistance of Rs. 135.86 crore for nutrition meant exclusively for children below three years was diverted for providing nutrition to all groups of beneficiaries.
The Assam government on Thursday banned clinical trials on humans of a genetically engineered vaccine developed by Dhaniram Baruah, a cardiac surgeon from the State. He claimed that the vaccine corrected genetic defects causing heart diseases and diabetes and even prevented cancer. Dr. Baruah was jailed by the State government in 1997 following the death of patient on whom he had carried out a transplantation of a pig's heart. The operation took place at his institute, the Dr. Baurah Heart City located at Sonapur, 20 km from here. He was released the same year. State Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma told the Assam Assembly that the State government would ask Dr. Baruah not to carry out further clinical trials of the vaccine without first obtaining a licence for it. The Minister said the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 and Drug and Magic Remedies Act, 1955 stipulated that after the successful clinical trial of any new drug on animals, one had to take the permission of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization for carrying out clinical trials on two humans after obtaining their consent. If the test on the two was successful then fresh permission had to be taken for conducting further trials on 10 more persons to establish its medical success. The Health Minister informed the House that Dr. Baruah had not obtained any permission from the drugs control authorities. Replying to a zero hour notice raised by Communist Party of India (Marxist) Ananta Deka, the Minister said the State government would also urge Dr. Baruah to hand over the materials in support of his claim for onward submission to the drugs control authorities. Mr. Deka drew the attention of the Minister to newspaper reports about Dr. Baruah's claim and demanded a high level probe.
We talk of herds of wild elephants creating havoc in human habitats. But what about humans who encroach on land especially reserved for wildlife. This has come to light when Early Birds, an NGO working for conservation of wildlife went on a cattle vaccination programme to Chanaka and Bharoitari, both fringe villages of Pobitora wildlife sanctuary. These villages are behind the Burha Mayang hill range and have no road connectivity. The team members of the NGO said that they could see a few dwelling houses next to a wildlife sentry camp and around 100-120 such houses of semi-permanent nature had sprang up in the riverside char areas just opposite to the sentry camp. The NGO said that this kind of settlements is a potential threat to the sanctuary and demanded that the park authorities with the help of the Morigaon and Darrang district administration evict the encroachers. The Early Birds team during the programme vaccinated 412 cattle including buffaloes. A large number of free medicines were also distributed.
About 80,000 chickens and ducks were culled and over Rs 20 lakh given as compensation to the affected people in Asom during the recent culling operation undertaken to avert the outbreak of avian flu in the State, especially in the districts bordering West Bengal. State Veterinary and Animal Husbandry Minister Khorsing Ingti informed the Assembly today that though no bird flu case was reported in the State, preventive culling was undertaken in Dhubri and Kokrajhar districts. In his reply to separate questions in the House, Ingti said altogether 50,640 birds were culled in Kokrajhar and 29,069 birds in Dhubri, while Rs 20,50,210 was given away as compensation
The Assam Assembly today witnessed a ruckus during the discussion on the implementation of National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in the State during the Question Hour. Replying to questions, State Panchayat and Rural Development (P & RD) Minister Chandan Brahma said the scheme was being implemented in its true spirit, benefiting the poor rural masses. The Opposition members, however, alleged that massive corruption was going on in the name of allocation of job cards under the NREGA, with middlemen and contractors being involved in the scheme. AGPLP leader Chandra Mohan Patowary said: "Even people from families that have Government job holders have been given job cards.' AGP member Keshab Mahanta, CPI-M members Ananta Kalita and Uddhab Barman, CPI member Dhrupad Buragohain and BJP member Ranjit Dutta alleged massive corruption in the distribution of job cards. Brahma, however, refuted the allegations and asked the Opposition to bring discrepancies, if any, to his notice. He said that 14 districts of the State that were not covered by the NREGA till 2007-08 would be brought under the scheme from the next fiscal, thereby extending the benefits of the scheme to all districts of the State. The minister further said that of the total Rs 72,883.93 lakh available for NREGA implementation during 2007-08 (up to January 2008), Rs 34,223.44 lakh had been spent. For the year 2005-06, of the total Rs 25,147.79 lakh made available, Rs 10,519.65 lakh was spent, whereas for 2006-07, Rs 57,987.40 lakh of the available Rs 70,772.10 lakh was spent.
MUSHALPUR
The Dhemaji district unit of the All Assam Students' Union (AASU) has asked the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) authorities to execute the decisions adopted at the December 8, 2006 tripartite meeting held among the AASU, NHPC and the State Government on the Lower Subansiri Hydel Project within March 13. It has also requested the NHPC authorities to keep in abeyance construction of the main dam of the hydel project till the report of the expert committee engaged to study the impacts of the dams becomes available. Otherwise, it has threatened a democratic agitation to mount pressure on the NHPC authorities to comply with this request. The students' body in a letter to the general manager of the NHPC's Lower Subansiri Hydel Project, said that the NHPC had failed to justify the inordinate delay in executing the tripartite meeting's decisions.
