Guwahati, Aug 25 (PTI) The Assam cabinet on Friday decided to create four new districts and 81 sub-districts following completion of the delimitation process to improve administrative efficiency, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said.
The four districts to be created are Hojai, Biswanath, Tamulpur and Bajali, Sarma said at a press conference after chairing the 100th cabinet meeting of his government.
“We have reconstituted the four new districts, and it is co-terminus with assembly constituencies declared by the Election Commission under delimitation,” he said.
The number of districts in Assam will now be 35.
The Assam government had on December 31, 2022, decided to merge the four districts with four others and change the administrative jurisdiction of a few villages, a day before the Election Commission’s freeze on redrawing administrative units came into effect due to the delimitation exercise.
Biswanath district was merged with Sonitpur, Hojai with Nagaon, Bajali with Barpeta and Tamulpur with Baksa Now, Hojai district will comprise Binnakandi, Lumding and Hojai assembly constituencies, Biswanath district will have Gohpur, Behali and Bishwanath seats, Tamulpur and Goreswar will be in Tamulpur district and Bajali, Bhabanipur and Sorbhog constituencies in Bajai district.
The cabinet also decided to dissolve 24 existing civil sub-divisions and instead create 81 sub-districts covering each assembly constituency with all administrative powers delegated to Additional District Commissioners, Sarma said.
The constituencies under the Sixth Schedule Autonomous Councils will be kept out of this process and consultations will be held with the stakeholders later.
The notification for the creation of the new districts and sub-districts will be issued on Saturday but will come into effect from January One, 2024.
The cabinet also approved the Assam Semiconductor Manufacturing and Electronic Production Policy for the first time in the state which will link production incentives and technical know-how among others so that the state can also enter into a competition with advanced states.
”Many industrialists have evinced interest in this regard due to the clean and pure water of River Brahmaputra and we have decided to bring in this policy to enable the setting up of semiconductor industries,” the chief minister said.
The cabinet also decided to institute a new award titled Most Outstanding District Initiative (MODI) Swacchata Puraskar with the best district being awarded Rs 100 crore.
It was decided at the meeting to increase the National Widow Pension in the state by Rs 950, from the existing Rs 300 to Rs 1250, he said.
The Council of Ministers also decided that for the appointment of primary teachers, more weightage, of around 85 per cent, will be given to the marks scored in the Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) while the remaining 15 per cent will include educational qualification and B.Ed marks, Sarma said.
The cabinet approved Rs 230 crore for the installation of 2600 CCTVs in Guwahati city, he said.
The chief minister said that during the last two years of his government, 100 cabinet meetings have been held and 1238 decisions were taken in 99 meetings with 1,217 of those already translated into action.
”During the last 20 years since 2002, 264 cabinet meetings were held but in only two years and four months, we have held 100 meetings and hopefully, we will soon surpass the figures of the last 20 years”, he said.
Earlier, many of the cabinet decisions were confidential but ”we have made public all the decisions taken so far in the weekly meetings to maintain transparency and we have compiled the decisions taken so far in ‘Cabinet Centennial – A Compendium of Decisions’ so that the people can track the implementation of the decisions”. Sarma said.
The first Cabinet meeting was held on May 11, 2021, here, while nine meetings were held in district headquarters of Dhemaji, Bongaigaon, Haflong, Tezpur, Kokrajhar, Silchar, Jorhat, Dibrugarh and Udalguri while three were held in New Delhi, including the 99th meeting on August nine. PTI DG NN
This report is auto-generated from PTI news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.