Our Correspondent
Imphal, June 15 (EMN): Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan on Thursday called upon the legislators of the eight North East states “to reflect the hopes and aspirations, even the fears and frustrations of the people on the floor of the house and influence policy making in the process.”
Addressing the four days of 16th North East Region Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (NERCPA) Conference at the Manipur assembly premises here, Lok Sabha Speaker Mahajan said, “As elected representatives, we have a great role to play in accelerating the implementation of the sustainable development goals, by way of legislations, house debate and parliamentary oversight, coordination with the executive irrespective of whether we are from the Treasury benches or the opposition.”
She also opined that the legislators to think how we’ll cooperate or how we can do something apart from asking what central government is doing as legislators is the bridge between the government and the public.
Stating the importance of establishing Speaker’s Research Initiative (SRI) in Lok Sabha in July 2015 she said,”I believe that a similar mechanism for the North Eastern states would be of great help to the legislators.”
Highlighting the centre’s initiative for the development of the NE states at macro well as micro level for the undeveloped, underdeveloped and remote areas of the NE state, she said ,”Our Prime Minister pays special attention to the NE states. Infrastructure such as transport, waterways and railways are being rapidly developed in the areas. Recently he opened longest river bridge link (The Dhola-Sadiya Bridge-9.5km) between Arunachal Pradesh and Assam.”
Deliberating on the tourism potential of the NE states, she said NE can provide tourism of many kinds like eco-tourism, ethno-tourism, golf and tea-tourism, heritage and adventure tourism.
Acknowledging the lack of infrastructure, connectivity, ethnic issues, militancy and unrest conflicts in the region, she said if all of us join hands together and work collectively for development and progress of all our countrymen then no problem will come. She said these are some of the common issues of the region which require close attention.
Manipur assembly speaker Yumnam Khemchand, Meghalaya assembly speaker AT Mondal and Deputy Chief Minister of Manipur Y Joykumar Singh also spoke during the day’s inaugural function of the conference.
The programme will deliberate on themes such as ‘North East and Look East Policy’, ‘Special plan for development of railways and airways for speedy economic development of North East region’, and ‘Setting up of a chapter of SRI in the region’.
The conference was attended Deputy Speaker of Lok Sabha Dr M Thambidurai, assembly speakers of all the eight NE states excluding Sikkim and Tripura.
