Naeem stresses on developing smart villages under convergence mode

Minister for Education, Naeem Akhtar chairing DDB meeting at Rajouri on Wednesday.
Minister for Education, Naeem Akhtar chairing DDB meeting at Rajouri on Wednesday.

Excelsior Correspondent
RAJOURI, May 18: The District Development Board Rajouri that met under the chairmanship of Minister for Education, Naeem Akhtar today approved an annual plan of Rs 197.33 crore for the district.
Minister for CA&PD, Choudhary Zulfkar Ali, Minister for Animal and Sheep Husbandry, Abdul Gani Kohli, Member Parliament, Jugal Kishore Sharma, Vice Chairman J&K State Pahari Advisory Board, Kuldeep Raj Gupta, Legislators Ravinder Raina, Qamar Hussain, Vibodh Gupta, Surinder Choudhary, District Development Commissioner, Shabir Ahmed Bhat, heads of various departments and senior officers were present in the meeting.
The Chairman took a comprehensive review of the implementation of the decisions taken in the last District Development Board meeting and directed for evolving effective mechanism to ensure implementation of all the decisions in letter and spirit so that benefits percolate down to the grassroots level.
While taking sector and scheme-wise review of the works done in the district, the Chairman expressed concern over the slow pace of repair and renovation works and directed the concerned executing agencies to expedite the works to improve the road network in the area.
While taking a review of the education sector, the Minister assured that the demands regarding upgradation and improvement of facilities in education sector would be considered on priority. He asked the Police Department to adopt schools under the Civic Action Programme for developing them as model school. The Board unanimously decided to make it mandatory for the fresh recruits to serve in those areas facing dearth of teachers so that adequate staff is ensured in all the schools and students are imparted quality education.
Appreciating the initiative of developing two tribal villages Hubbi and Targain as smart villages under the convergence programme, the Minister said that the same should be extended to other constituencies also. He said that proactive approach and out of the box ideas are needed to bring about tangible results which can bring about a positive change in the life of the rural masses.
Local representatives raised various issues and put forth the demands of respective constituencies to which the Chairman gave a patient hearing and assured to address them in shortest possible time.
While speaking on the occasion, MP Jugal Kishore Sharma asserted that the issues raised by local representatives should be settled on priority as these are the aspirations of public. He asked the officers to expedite work on repair/renovation of roads toilet complex enroute Buddha Amarnath in Sunderbani and stressed   on achieving the targets within prescribed time frame.