ASSAM

The Assam government signed an MoU with the Indian Institute Of Management (IIM) Bangalore with an aim to bring transformative changes in Health, Education, Women, and child development in the state, officials said. The MoU has been inked for a two-year Chief Minister’s Young Professional Programme (CMYPP) which would start next year. The is aiming to develop a cadre of committed and competent leaders and facilitators to support the government administration under this programme.

The CMYPP has been planned for providing short-term catalytic support to the District Administration to improve program delivery in the identified sectors like health, education, women, and child development.

CMYPP is designed to support district administration in implementing priority sectors like NHM, RMSA, SSA, POSHAN, and other government flagship programmes.

In a move to involve charitable organisations in all key government sectors, theAssamgovernment wants all its departments to seekCSR fundsand international fundings for state projects, top government sources said.

Highlighting Health and Education departments in particular, the government wants these two departments to approach the likes of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Seattle-based worlds second largest charitable foundation, for funds.

Assam wants to create a platform for corporates to make more contribution to the state considering their footprints and markets in the state, which is a part of the roadmap for pushing the states GDP to Rs 6 lakh crore in the next four years and move to the bracket of top five states.

The state had adopted a CSR policy in 2019 with an aim to harness the CSR funds optimally.

The Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International Airport in Guwahati was handed over to the Adani Group for operations, management and development responsibilities.

Beginning the process of developing and modernising the Northeast’s foremost airport, the symbolic key of the airport was handed over by Ramesh Kumar, Airport Director of the Authority of India (AAI). To Utpal Baruah, Chief Airport Officer of the new airport operator at an event held midnight.

In 2018, the government of India included the Guwahati airport in the group of six airports — Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Mangalore, Jaipur and Thiruvananthapuram — set for privatisation for operations, management and development (OMD) for a period of 50 years.

The National Development Board (NDDB) and Assam government will form a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to promote dairying in Assam. Officiating chairman of NDDB Meenesh Shah presented Assams dairy development roadmap before Assam chief minister Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma on Monday in Guwahati.

The CM emphasized that initiatives should be commercially viable and sufficiently remunerative for the dairy farmers of Assam. Shah said that the plan will include creating processing infrastructures, village level institutions and Marketing of milk and milk products.

Assam government had earlier requested NDDB to manage the West Assam Cooperative Milk Union (WAMUL) which was on verge of closure. NDDB had taken over its management in 2008.

The AllAssamStudents Union (Aasu) has welcomed constituency delimitation draft byECIfor Assam, when scores of organisations and are up in arms against it.
After being silent since publication of the delimitation draft last month, the Aasu Leadership, in a news conference here on Wednesday, called the draft publication a positive beginning.

Contrary to the objections put forward by the opposition parties on the decision to carry out the ongoing delimitation exercise based on the 2001 census, Aasu said 2001 as thebase yearis welcome for the ongoing delimitation. But in future delimitation exercises, Aasu said it should be based on the 1991 census.

The demographic pattern of the constituencies has changed in Assam over the years due to illegal infiltration. Had the delimitation exercise been carried out based on the 1991 census figures, we could have expected better representation of the indigenous people from the constituencies. Delimitation based on 2011 is totally undesirable as in many constituencies the demographic pattern has changed due to illegal infiltration, Aasu president (in-charge) Utpal Sarma said.

Calling the state’s indigenousMuslimsas ‘Assamese Muslims’, chief minister Himanta BiswaSarma asked members of the minority community to devise ways to rein inpopulationgrowth and prepare a roadmap to expedite welfare measures, including financial well-being and overall development of the community.

In order to achieve that goal, Sarma said it has been insisted upon that eight sub-groups be constituted to work on a range of issues – Health, Education, Population control, cultural identity, , Women Empowerment and Skill development.

The dilemma on college admissions inAssamended on Wednesday, as the Assam Education department launched acommonadmission portal inSamarthe-gov suite as perthe NationalEducation Policy-2020 for admission to all colleges offering undergraduate (UG) courses.

Pegu said from this academic session itself, colleges will have to join Samarth. He said even as competitiveness is growing due to an increasing number of aspirants knocking on the doors of higher educational institutions.

Assamchief ministerHimanta Biswa Sarma announced the gradual implementation of the two-child policy for availing government benefits in Assam.
However, tea garden workers and members ofScheduled Casteand Scheduled Tribe communities have been exempted from its purview.

Mentioning that the new Population norms would affect the eligibility for government benefits, including waiver of loans, Sarma said, “Be it loan waiver or other government schemes, population norms will be taken into account. It won’t be applicable to tea garden workers and SC-ST community. In the future, population norms will be taken into account as eligibility for government benefits. Population policy has begun.”
The Assam government had approved a proposal to render people having more than two children as ineligible for government jobs from January 1, 2021.

Earlier, appearing in the Assamese subject was not mandatory to pass the Class 10 board exam in Assam under the state board. There is no change in the policy, but Sebas recent notification made it compulsory to read Assamese as a subject in Class 9 and 10 in the schools affiliated to it.

Assam intends to shut itsremaining madrassasafter having already converted those that used to be funded by the state into general schools because there is no need for any such religious Education in new India, chief ministerHimanta Biswa Sarmasaid on Thursday in poll-bound Karnataka.

What Assam needs are schools, colleges and universities to produce doctors, engineers and other professionals to serve the state and the country, Sarma told a gathering at the inauguration of a Light-and-Sound show on Chhatrapati Shivaji in Belagavi.