AIIMS, IIT and IIM to come up in north Bengal

PTI

SILIGURI, May 20: West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Wednesday said that an AIIMS, an IIT and an IIM will be set up in the northern part of the state, while ordering steps for qualitative development of the lives of tea garden workers in the region.

The BJP’s election manifesto for West Bengal promised the establishment of an AIIMS, an IIT and an IIM in North Bengal.

Briefing reporters on Adhikari’s first administrative meeting here in north Bengal, BJP’s Darjeeling MP Raju Bista said that the CM also stressed the need for improving healthcare infra-structure in the region.

He said that Adhikari, who took oath as the chief minister of the first BJP government in West Bengal on May 9, assured the people that an AIIMS would be set up to ensure proper healthcare in north Bengal.

“Apart from the AIIMS, an IIT, an IIM and a cancer hospital will be set up in north Bengal,” Bista said.

These institutes will come up in different districts of the region.

“The CM has also directed that no objection certificates (NOC) for various development projects be issued by the authori-ties without delay,” the MP said.

Bista said that Adhikari has also asked for special initiatives for development work in the border areas near Bangladesh and Nepal.

He said that with more than five lakh directly employed people and 20 lakh indirect beneficiaries of the tea gardens dotting the northern districts of the state, the chief minister stressed the bet-terment of the condition of tea garden workers.

“The CM asked the Tea Board chairman and other officials to study the Assam tea garden worker welfare model and asked them to come up with pointers on what would be the issues involved in implementing the same here,” Bista said.

New labour law will be implemented in the tea gardens in the future, and betterment of the workers’ lives in line with that in Assam will be ensured, the BJP said.

“The CM has ordered implementation of the Centre’s Chai Srameek Yojana, which was blocked by the previous TMC government for the last three years,” he said, adding that Rs 350 crore worth of benefits are pending to Bengal’s tea garden workers under the scheme. (PTI)