The spook of ethnic insurgency no longer haunts Assam’s development. It now grapples with more terrifying spectres, like staff crunch. The 23 district collectors (deputy commissioners in the northeast) didn’t mince words in saying as much at a meeting called by chief minister Tarun Gogoi in Guwahati on April 23-24.
Gogoi, who completes a year in office on May 18, has made transparency in administration his main mission. So he threw the meeting open to the media. For four hours, as the DCs presented progress reports, scribes heard first-hand the schemes and projects each district had undertaken and the constraints each administrator faced in implementation. Instead of dwelling on insurgency, all of them talked about shortage of officers and health workers.
The Gogoi government now wants to take the interface further. Says he: "We’ve pledged to provide an open administration. What better way than this?"
