Mrunal Manmay Dash

Targeting the Odisha government, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Tuesday said that there is not only a nutrition deficit among infants of Odisha, but the State has also been crippled by a governance deficit as well.

Pradhan said this while speaking to reporters at the Rojgar Mela where appointment letters were distributed to 473 persons selected in several central government services.

“India’s economy is on overdrive. It is the fifth largest in the world. I have high hopes from the youths who received appointment letters in this Rojgar Mela. I would like to urge the new appointees to fulfil the aspirations of the country as well as their individual ambitions,” Pradhan said.

Citing a State government report, he said, “A lot of mothers and their infants are in a very dire situation due to malnutrition. The infants are failing to attain physical and mental growth for the same reason.”

“The deficit in nutrition exposes the deficit in governance. The infants of tribal communities in Odisha are having a hard time to find enough nutrition. I would like to urge Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to look into the matter and eradicate this deficit in governance,” he said.

“If a government is claiming good governance, then it should work on it and prove time and again that it has surpassed the expectations of the people,” Pradhan added.

Asked about Naveen Patnaik’s jibe at the Centre saying Odisha does not need a double-engine government, Pradhan said, “Double-engine government anyways can’t happen in Odisha as the State is running on a single engine and that is of Narendra Modi.”

Celebrating BJD’s Jharsuguda bypoll victory, Chief Minister & party president, Naveen Patnaik on Saturday said, the single-engine or double-engine government is not important, but from people’s point of view, governance matters.

  • Reported by:
  • SOUMYA RANJAN SAHOO
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