Show me DPRs: CM

By Our Staff Reporter

GUwahati, Feb.27: Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi today expressed surprise that Union Minister for Road Transport, Highways & Shipping Nitin Jayram Gadkari went about laying the foundation stone of two bridges connecting Sivasagar and North Lakhimpur via Desangmukh and another connecting Jorhat and North Lakhimpur via Majuli without preparing the Detailed Project Reports (DPRs).

Chief Minister Gogoi said that the foundation stone laying of the two bridges by Union Minister Gadkari today in the State without preparing the DPRs has exposed that the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre is out to "hoodwink the people with an eye to the upcoming Assembly election".

Gogoi is learnt to have skipped the meetings - even though he was invited - on this pretext.

"I have never seen a Central government like the present one which has gone on a foundation stone laying spree without preparing the DPRs. They are out to hoodwink the people with an eye to the elections," he said.

Gogoi questioned how the project cost for the two massive bridges across Brahmaputra be estimated without preparing DPRs, which include feasibility report.  

The Chief Minister said that though Central ministers, including the Prime Minister, have made over 200 trips to Assam in the past 19 months, nothing concrete has materialized so far.

"Central ministers, including Prime Minister rendra Modi, have been making a beeline to the State, trying to create an impression that the present dispensation at the Centre has a soft corner towards Assam and the Northeast region as a whole. However, nothing concrete has emerged.  What the Prime Minister iugurated were outcomes of the initiatives of the previous Congress-led UPA government," he added.