Development

AGARTALA, Dec 21 ? Dhaka has okayed issuance of double entry visa for Indians, facilitating movement of the people of landlocked Tripura to other parts of the country through Bangladesh. Sajjad Taimur, first secretary of Bangladesh visa office here, told reporters today that he received the nod of his country for issuing double entry visa for Indians.

The people of Tripura had long been demanding a transit through Bangladesh for reaching Kolkata, the nearest metropolis, by road within a day as it takes about three days through Assam. The only other way to reach Kolkata from here is to take a...

GUWAHATI, Dec 21 ? The international borders in South Asia are no longer the neat mosaic of colourful societies, cultures and states. They are the zones of concentrated violence and landscapes of fear for the people living within these areas. This was how Dutch social scientist Willem van Schendel, a professor of Modern Asian History at the University of Amsterdam, described the international borders of South Asia.

He was delivering a lecture in a seminar on maps, borders and identities and the need to re-imagine South Asia in the city yesterday. The seminar was organised by the Centre for...

SHILLONG, Dec 21? That all is not well in the DD Lapang-led MDA coalition government in Meghalaya was thoroughly exposed today when it failed to get the Contingency Fund of Meghalaya (Amendment) Bill, 2004, passed in the House despite its majority position.

Yesterday, it had suffered a major humiliation when a private member?s resolution, moved by HS Lyngdoh of HSPDP, an ally of the ruling coalition, opposing the governments plan to shift the State Assembly building to Mawdiangdiang in the city outskirts was adopted in the House by a voice vote.

Former Home Minister and Congress MLA, RG...

NEW DELHI, Dec 21? Both the Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL) and Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) are in the race for the mega gas cracker project and the two oil giants have been given three months to submit feasibility report to the Centre, a Parliamentary Panel has been told. The Central Government has come under increasing pressure to implement the mega gas cracker project, with a Parliamentary Standing Committee on Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers expressing its disappointment at the inordinate delay. It has asked the Department of Chemicals and Petrochemicals to give a...

NEW DELHI, Dec 21 ? In a move aimed at bailing out the small tea growers, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, Kamal Nath announced the decision to set up Small Growers Development Agency shortly. Addressing a meeting of Members of Parliament representing the tea growing regions of the country at the Parliament house here today, he said that modalities of the agency proposed to be formed under the Tea Board of India, would be finalised soon.

There are around 1,23,279 small tea gardens spread over the states of Assam, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Tripura, Karnataka, Uttaranchal and...

NEW DELHI, Dec 21 ? The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved an assistance of $ 150 million to Assam for managing its fiscal and revenue deficits. Based on the progress of the first programme, the ADB would consider a second loan of $ 100 million for ?deeper fiscal consolidation and governance reforms? over two years starting from December 2007.

?To successfully fulfill its development objectives, including growth and poverty reduction, the Assam State Government must address its fiscal imbalances and enhance governance,? ADB senior governance specialist Arjun Goswami said in a statement...

NEW DELHI, Dec 21 ? United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa today informed noted litterateur Dr Mamoni Roisom Goswami through an e-mailed letter that ULFA C-in-C Paresh Baruah was now out of danger.

Baruah, whose health condition has been creating confusion here following the e-mailed statement of Rajkhowa a few days back that he was ill, is now in bed rest after the successful ?surgery? he underwent, said the ULFA chairman. Baruah will have to be in bed rest for a few weeks, Rajkhowa said in his letter to Dr Goswami. He also said that the information passed on by...

SHILLONG, Dec 20 ? Meghalaya Chief Minister DD Lapang today said the state was following the guidelines and directives of the Planning Commission since it did not frame a ?consolidated? economic policy of its own. Although there was no economic policy framed by the state, the ?guidelines and directives? of the Planning Commission in respect of sectoral allocation were being followed and quarterly reports, review meetings held to prepare utilisation certificiates to pursue the economic goal, Lapang said in the assembly during question hour.

The Meghalaya Economic Development Council (MEDC)...

GUWAHATI, Dec 20 ? The competence of the British engineers was such that the river Kopili remained a friend for the people of the two districts of Morigaon and Nagaon for about a century despite human interference in the realm of nature. But the expertise of the engineers under the post-independent system has reduced the symbiotic relation between the river and the people into a myth.

This will be preserved by the people in their memories in the shapes of lullabies and folk-tales. This is the feeling dominating the popular psyche in these two districts nowadays. With the worst-ever havoc of...

SHILLONG, Dec 20 ? Thirty-two years after the creation of the hill State of Meghalaya, the languages spoken by the major tribes in the State, viz, Khasi and Garo, are poised to be recognized as associate official languages along with English language. Meghalaya Chief Minister Dr DD Lapang today introduced the Meghalaya State Language Bill, 2004, in the State Assembly today to fulfil the long-pending wishes of the people of the State to give the rightful status to Khasi and Garo languages.

The Bill once adopted will provide for the usage of Khasi language as the associate official language in...