Imphal, June 23: The State Government has revised the cost of the Loktak Down Stream Project to be taken up under the Prime Minister's package and reduced the cost of the project by Rs 87.30 crs from the earlier estimated cost of Rs 758.92 crs. The revision was made following an agreement between State Government officials and the Power Secretary, Government of India on May 16. The total cost was reduced to Rs 671.61 crs as per the price index of March this year. The revised project report has been submitted to the Centre. However it is still not clear whether the report has been accepted by...

GUWAHATI, June 22? Yet another scam of misappropriation of public funds surfaces in a Government department of this fund-starved State. The department is the Social Welfare Department and the amount involved is around Rs 2.10 crore. The modus operandi of the scamsters in this case was that they used to make ?payments against fictitious bills for ?supply? of nutritious items in Tribal Sub-Plan (TSP) areas between 1999 and 2001. The scheme was drawn under the Pradhan Mantri Gramodaya Yojana (PMGY) for the benefit of the children. Though there was a strict direction to transfer the amounts to...

JAMUGURIHAT, June 22? Three businessmen were killed by militants belonging to the National Democratic Front of Boroland (NDFB) at Yogibeel near Assam-Arunachal Pradesh border under Rangapara police station at around 9 p.m. yesterday. According to information available, five NDFB militants in Army fatigue, armed with AK 47 rifles and 9 mm pistols, came to Yogibeel area on foot and picked up Jiten Boro (30), general secretary of the Yogibeel business committee from his residence. They also picked up two other businessmen from the area-Zarman Daimary and Saman Basumatary and asked them about the...

DHUBRI, June 22 ? Forest department of Dhubri started eviction of encroachers from forest lands from June 9 last. On that day Forest department personnel evicted 10 families from their unauthorised occupation of land in the Rajapara proposed reserve forest. Ten huts erected by the families on the encroached land for dwelling purpose were also dismantled. According to Forest department sources, a total of five hectares of land were freed in the process. It is learnt from the Divisional Forest Office source that Dhubri district has a total of 27831.38 hactres of reserve forest areas, and 18587...

KOKRAJHAR, June 22 ? The Bodo Liberation Tiger (BLT) has expressed strong resentment over the State government?s dilly-dallying attitude in solving long-standing problems of the Bodos. The outfit blamed the government functionaries entrusted to solve the Bodo tangle for the delay. Referring to the State Government?s commitment to framing modalities with regard to creation of Bodoland Territory as a core issue duly submitted to the Central Government, the BLT said the government has failed to keep its earlier promiseson substantive issues touched upon during several rounds of negotiations at...