Agartala: Tripura government mulls a perspective plan for 25 years and the strategies to achieve the target, said Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb last evening while felicitating seven editors and senior journalists of the state as part of the celebration of National Press Day.
Deb said the council of ministers in a meeting yesterday discussed the issue after reviewing the development roadmap prepared by different departments of the government and the Chief Secretary was told to set the periodical achievement milestones and explore the provision of finance for the implementation of the prospective plan.
“I had started my days as Chief Minister with the idea that I shall develop the industry here. After some time I changed my mind when I saw agriculture and allied sectors had been neglected by my predecessors despite having immense potential,” Deb pointed out.
He explained the previous government didn’t have any scheme for supporting the actual farmers. The man who is having land doesn’t do farming, the farmers are producing crops in the land of others. As a result, actual farmers never got the scope to get bank loans or public sector financing because they had no legal document to prove their claims.
“My government has introduced a scheme for the cultivators who don’t have land in their possession. In addition to it, about 3.33 lakh small and marginal farmers have been getting Rs 6000 per annum in three equal installments under Prime Minister Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana and the benefits extended in five other schemes to encourage the cultivators,” Deb said, adding that FCI is procuring paddy every year at a reasonable rate that stabilises the private market too.
The animal husbandry and fishery sectors were equally ignored in the previous regime due to the short-sightedness of the then government.
The domestic demands of fish, meat, egg and milk have been meeting up from other states and the local economy has continued to suffer. The BJP-IPFT government undertook strong initiatives to strengthen the state’s economy and pluck the outflow of the state’s money.
“Yet, slowly but steadily we are growing. Self Help Groups (SHG) has been linked with KCC loans and the number has increased over 26000 from 4000 in three years because of the policy change and strategic intervention of our government. Today, SHG based economy rolled in Rs 1000 Cr,” the Chief Minister claimed.
Deb also appealed to the media not to avoid blaming him for whatever is happening across the state and argued, “We are fighting against a culture that has flourished and nourished over decades in the state. While running the administration we have on several occasions encountered a mindset of avoiding responsibilities. We are trying hard to change this culture but for that we need time, it is not possible to change things in a minute or two.”
