THREE YEARS OF GOGOI GOVERNMENT

Pabitra Chaudhuri

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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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