A year of self-satisfaction: Jogi

By Aarti Dhar

RAIPUR, OCT. 30. It has been a year of self-satisfaction. This is how the Chhatisgarh Chief Minister, Mr. Ajit Jogi, describes his first year in office.

Despite the BALCO issue and controversies over his tribal status, Mr. Jogi says he has been able to lay the foundation for a strong administration and proceeded in the right direction in regard to development and welfare.

``As I look back, I feel we have been able to do more than what we thought,'' he told The Hindu on the eve of the first anniversary of the State. The noises made by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for not inviting the Prime Minister, Mr. A. B. Vajpayee, to the occasion and their subsequent decision to boycott the functions hardly seem to have disturbed him.

Mr. Jogi, who managed to score over his political rivals last year in making it to the Chief Minister's office, has no regrets on any front. ``On the contrary, I never thought I would be able to achieve so much because of teething problems,'' he points out referring to the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) Government at the Centre for its obvious indifference towards development of the State.

Denial of special status to Chhatisgarh and not being generous at all as far as distribution of funds is concerned have hampered development of the State to a great extent. ``Inspite of all these handicaps, we have been able to succeed primarily because the people have been with us,'' he says.

The Chief Minister's biggest achievement of the year, perhaps, has been the `food for work' programme. Under this scheme, over five lakh metric tonnes of foodgrain was consumed which is the highest quantity consumed under any scheme in the country. Assets worth Rs. 550 crores have been created and over 12 lakh people were given employment. But, most importantly, we have been virtually able to stop distress migration, he adds.

Spelling out other achievements, Mr. Jogi says four medical colleges and three agriculture colleges have been added during the last one year. As much as 75,000 hectares of land was brought under irrigation which is probably the largest area to be irrigated in about 12 months.

``While the country was witnessing recession, we have signed Memorandums of Understanding (MoU) worth Rs. 15,000 crores. Chhatisgarh was the only State which had an investment- friendly climate.''

The State is surplus in energy and now it has 12 more 133 KVA electric sub-stations as against just 21 set up during 54 years after Independence. In the social sector, English has been introduced as a compulsory subject from Class 1 and to fulfill the requirement, as many as 28,000 teachers were given crash courses in English to ensure there was no dearth of English teachers.

To improve the standard of education, the State Government adopted the CBSE system in 25 per cent of its schools and a major drive was launched for enrolment in school. Describing this as a major success, the Chief Minister says 95 per cent of those who should be in school were enrolled.

But then, these are just figures. The most satisfying feeling is that of confidence the people have in themselves now, Mr. Jogi believes. ``That sense of inferiority complex is not there any more and the innocent people of this land now live with a sense of achievement.''

Chhatisgarh was in the eye of a storm just a few months after its creation in the wake of privatisation of the Bharat Aluminium Company Limited (BALCO) where thousands of workers went on strike for two months in protest against disinvestments and where the Chief Minister played an active role to ensure the success of the strike though he did a sort of back out when an agreement was reached between the new management, the workers and the Government.

Another major issue raked up earlier this month that threatened Mr. Jogi's existence in office was the order by the chairman of the National Commission for Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe describing him as a non-tribal. The status is important for Mr. Jogi as he has won the Assembly elections from a ST reserve seat of Marwahi.

Earlier, also he had been sent to Parliament from the reserved seat of Raigarh. The matter is still pending though the Chhatisgarh High Court has issued a stay on the order and its implementation.

No, the Chief Minister has not set any priorities for the coming year. The goals have already been made public through the policies and my endeavour would be to achieve these targets, he says adding that though he is in a hurry to remove the unfortunate paradox of the richest piece of land inhabited by the poorest people.

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