Friday, March 18, 2011

Like varsity, proposed K'handi rail wagon unit a mirage!

The Pioneer, March 18, 2011
PIONEER NEWS SERVICE, DHARAMGARH

An aura of apprehensions writ large over the faces of the people of Kalahandi district here anticipating that the venue of the proposed Rail Wagon Factory is going to meet the same fate of the Central University.

Sources confided that Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has, meanwhile, written a letter to Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee to set up the proposed rail wagon project in Ganjam district instead, represented by him while Didi has assured Kalahandi MP and her former counterpart Bhakta Charan Das in the Parliament for Kalahandi as it has earned a dubious distinction at the national level for being one of the country's most poverty-ridden districts.

Needless to mention that despite the huge flow of funds over the years for the development of the district, poverty still stares in the face yielding no fruitful results yet.

The main cause can be attributed to lack of political will, able leadership and MLAs and MPs being at loggerheads following which the past bitter experience has already been evident in the case of setting-up of the Central University that got unfortunately shifted from Kalahandi to Koraput even though both being a part and parcel of the so-called favoured triangle of the KBK region.

Moreover, the Chief Minister, during his visit to Kalahandi recently, was presented a memorandum by the aggrieved political parties, intellectual forums and different organisations here reiterating the mass demand and urging him to recommend for the setting-up of the proposed rail wagon factory in Kalahandi.

However, reliable sources revealed that Naveen has not yet taken any steps in this direction and has rather recommended for his own home turf Ganjam for the project following which a strong wave of resentment is brewing among the people across the district here as yet another betrayal is looming large like that of the Central University.

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