making
profits.
ASTC is an example of turna round. Only a few years back it
has been seriously sick-today it is a running extremely well
and has become a role-model for other State Transport Corporations
to follow. Fishery development in Assam has made a tremendous
impect in making Assam a self-sufficient fish producer so much
so that some of the fish from Assam go to Meghalaya and other
States in North-east.
APOL which was closed down for sometimes is being revived soon.
Thus it may run into production from mid-june this year. There
are copious instances of young people making a mark in the field
of entrepreneurship. The packaging industry is doing extremely
well and in a town like Jorhat, The Hindustan Lever is so happy
with a young enterpreneur's packaging skill that they have outsourced
a good deal of their packaging work to the firm of this young
person. Similarly a young enterpreneur at Mangaldoi is simultaneously
engaged in bottling and packaging for Horlicks as well as producing
better quality 'Atta' from wheat procured locally , packaging
them in verious sizes. He has captured the market in a big way.
Kudos are also due to the Industries Department for encouraging
such activities.
Tourism could be another potential industrty and the Chief Minister
himself being in-charge of Tourism, has addressed himself assiduously
to develop tourism. Hitherto tourism was restricted only to
Kamakhya and kaziranga. Today, at the instance of Chief Minister
Gogoi, the Department has designed and marketed variuos packages
like adventure tourism, heritage tourism, pilgrimage tourism,
tea garden festivals etc. What is more remarkable is that a
Vedic villege like Kerala with four state facilities is on the
anvil near Mandakata T.E. at North guwahati. There is already
a herbal garden there owned by the Ayurvedic Products Limited
(ASIDC) of about 100 bighas from where herbs are being brought
to the company to produce |
Ayurvedic
and Herbal medicine which has a large market. The idea is
to have Kerala-style hutments, boating, fishing, holistic
health care ornamental fish products and to have a centre
of eco-tourism. This indeed will be the jewel in the crown
of Gogoi Government. Properly tapped it will be a source of
employment and revenue earning.
The Education Department is the largest official unit in assam
as far as man-power is concerned. More attention has to paid
to put the schools particularly in the rural areas, on the
right track. Inspection efforts need to be geared up. In the
private sector, elitist types of schools have sprung up at
Guwahati like the DPS, Sanskriti, Sarala Birla, Kaziranga
Academy etc. What is needed is to improve schools in the rural
areas and in towns, like focus can be laid on Cotton Collegiate
School, TC School, Kamrup Academy, Sonaram High School among
others for example in Guwahati.
The way of Gogoi Government is concerned with rural development,
it should pay good dividends and if it continues to be so,
anti-incumbency factor will never affect Chief Minister Gogoi.
The good result of the recent Lok sabha pools have further
strengthened his hands, and the win is more for the development
work initiated by him in the rural areas and generally because
of good governance as well as for his clean image. It is a
relief to see that the Gogoi does not suffer from "Lap-topism"
although he realises the role of IT, MIS etc., and believes
that to a certain extent it is necessary to introduce IT service,
E-governance etc. he does not make a fetish of going the extra
mile for it. One may say that he has been able to deliver
good governance and rightly has he given more importance in
meeting periodically the Deputy Commissioners (for they are
the front-line administrators in district contact with the
people) and monitoring this their work and getting their feed-back
with the strict stipulation of making the administration public-friendly.
Telephone network being so effective, he makes the best use
of it instead of carrying a 'lap-top' to keep up with
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