Critical appraisal: Gogoi focuses on midday meals, roads, water

GUWAHATI - For the second straight day, Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi Thursday made a critical appraisal of his government’s performance, specifically targeting the midday meal scheme in schools, road construction and drinking water facilities in rural areas.

“The chief minister reviewed the midday meal scheme and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan in the state,” Sarat Saikia, parliamentary secretary in-charge of education, told IANS.

The chief minister addressed a two-day conference of deputy commissioners (DC) in Guwahati that ended Thursday.

“Instructions were given to the deputy commissioners to ensure that the midday meal scheme reaches all schools, besides improving infrastructure facilities in schools under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan.”

The Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan is an effort to universalise elementary education.

The chief minister also attacked the Public Health Engineering (PHE) department for failing to provide clean drinking water facilities to the rural poor.

“The chief minister did a threadbare discussion on various schemes and specifically asked for speeding up drinking water facilities. The poor maintenance of existing schemes were found to be the reason for failure of some projects,” PHE Minister Rihon Daimary said after the meeting.

“We have taken note of the chief minister’s suggestions and will carry out his instructions accordingly.”

Gogoi also hit out at the Panchayat and Rural Development Department, particularly expressing unhappiness at the lack of progress in implementation of road scheme in rural areas.

“We want speedy development so that the benefits of all the state and central government schemes reach the people,” the chief minister said.

On Wednesday, the chief minister literally admitted that the progress card in vital sectors like poverty alleviation, employment, agriculture, irrigation, public distribution system and education was not at all satisfactory.

The chief minister’s critical appraisal of development schemes is seen as a signal that the Congress government is trying hard for a third straight term by winning the Assam assembly elections due before May 2011.