Development / Northeast

Guwahati, Feb. 4: Three chief ministers have sought an emergent meeting of the North Eastern Council (NEC) to discuss the adverse fallout of the finance ministry?s decision to prune the council?s budgetary allocation for 2003-04 by nearly Rs 420 crore.

The three chief ministers ? Tarun Gogoi of Assam, Manik Sarkar of Tripura and Zoramthanga of Mizoram ? have also dashed off letters to the Prime Minister for restoration of the outlay of Rs 750 crore, which was originally recommended by the planning commission.

Assam minister of state for planning and development Himanta Biswa Sarma today said...

NEW DELHI, Feb 3 ? The north-eastern region has little to cheer about the interim Budget presented by Union Finance Minister Jaswant Singh here today, as the only concession aimed at benefitting the region was a package envisaged to bail out the ailing tea industry.

Assam and other States in the region have again been over-looked as far as setting up of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) pattern institutes are concerned. Extending the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana (PMSSY), the Finance Minister announced that one medical college each in Andhra Pradesh, Jammu &...

Kohima, Feb. 2: The Nagaland government has proposed an 80-km diversion in the Dimapur-Imphal highway before making it a four-lane one.

Prime Minster Atal Bihari Vajpayee had announced a more than Rs 400-crore project to upgrade the National Highway 39, commonly known as Dimapur-Imphal highway here, during his visit to the state in October last year. The state government is understood to have proposed the diversion via Niuland to capital Kohima in fear of paying huge compensation to landowners if the present stretch was to be kept intact.

Nagaland resident commissioner Ponraj attended a...

Silchar, Jan. 28: Mizoram chief minister Zoramthanga will inaugurate the region?s second border trade centre at Zokhawthar on the state?s border with Myanmar on Friday. Official sources at Aizawl said the centre would facilitate extensive trade in goods produced in India and Myanmar.

Minimum tariff would be slapped on the indigenous industrial and agricultural products to boost trade and curb cross-border smuggling, a source said.

The first trade centre at Moreh on the Manipur-Myanmar border was commissioned in 1995 following the signing of a protocol by the two countries.

Zokhawthar, a...

New Delhi, Jan. 21: The Centre and the industry today joined hands to promote tourism in the Northeast. ?Tourism in the Northeast is languishing behind in comparison to other states. This sector is a real selling point for the Northeast,? said Jayanta Sanyal, adviser to the planning commission.

Addressing delegates at the second Northeast business summit here today, he said: ?The Northeast needs to be given a brand identity. Infrastructure problems and security measures must be handled with immediate effect.?

Speaking on the occasion, Amitabh Kant, joint secretary in the ministry of tourism...

Guwahati, Jan. 18: India is shining ? at least the ads say so ? and the Northeast does not want to miss the opportunity to bask in its glow.

In a prelude to the second Northeast business summit at New Delhi?s Vigyan Bhavan from Tuesday, the region?s oldest chamber of commerce has suggested a slew of measures to Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to remove the ?economic disparity? between the seven states and the rest of the country.

The Prime Minister will inaugurate the summit, which will be attended by the chief ministers of the Northeast and corporate leaders.

The summit has been...

New Delhi, Jan. 15: The North Eastern Electric Power Corporation (Neepco) has turned around with a profit of Rs 123 crore in the first three quarters of the current fiscal as against a loss of Rs 408 crore last year. Neepco, with an installed capacity of 1,130 MW, is expected to end the year with a net profit of Rs 160 crore, company chairman and managing director S.C. Sharma told reporters here today.

Sharma also threw light on plans to improve its credit rating over the next three years.

The company?s previous highest profit was Rs 120 crore in 2000-01. The power generating company, that...

Imphal, Dec. 31: A secessionist outfit of Manipur today welcomed the ambitious 1,360-km-long trilateral highway project connecting the country with Myanmar and Thailand. The banned Revolutionary People?s Front (RPF) in a statement said the proposed project would benefit Manipur.

Foreign ministers of the three countries, in a meeting in New Delhi on December 23, agreed to take up the $700 million project linking Moreh of Manipur and Maesot of Thailand through Bagan of Myanmar. The foreign ministers decided to launch the first phase of the project, which would cost $252 million, from early next...

GUWAHATI, Dec 31 ? Finding women entrepreneurs are more sincere in repaying loans, the North Eastern Development Finance Corporation Limited (NEDFi) has launched a special scheme to promote women enterprises in the New Year. The Chairman cum Managing Director (CMD) of the NEDFi, J P Saikia told this newspaper that soft loans as well as term loans upto maximum amount of Rs 4.25 lakh would be provided to women entrepreneurs under the scheme with repayment period ranging from three years to five years.

?The NEDFi is trying to help sincere women entrepreneurs who have been running from pillar to...

SHILLONG, Dec 30 ? Barring Manipur (38.96 per cent) and Nagaland (30.59 per cent), in all other States of the north-eastern region, the proportion of gross irrigated area as percentage of gross cropped area various from nearly eight per cent to 18 per cent, which is much less than that of the national average. In light of this, the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), New Delhi, has recently taken initiative to make ?Rainwater harvesting? a popular technology in the region.

The North East, in fact the entire country has a ?millennia tradition? of rainwater harvesting, this was pointed...