Bhubaneswar: Reiterating that fulfilling the aspirations of people holds supreme place, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today announced that Sachivalaya or the State secretariat will now be called as ‘Lok Seva Bhawan’.
“I am highly indebted to the people of the State and will continue to work hard to fulfill the aspirations of our people. In a democracy, people are the masters and we all exist to serve them. I take this opportunity to announce that ‘Sachivalaya’ or Secretariat will be called as Lok Seva Bhawan,” said Patnaik.
Patnaik made this announcement while moving the expenditure relating to Home Department in Assembly today.
The CM further stated that his government has enunciated 5T mantra (Technology, Teamwork, Transparency and Time leading to Transformation) to take the delivery of services and governance to the next level.
On the other hand, the Opposition parties- BJP and Congress, during discussion on Home department’s expenditure, targeted Odisha government over the deteriorating law and order situation in the State.
Leader of Opposition, Pradipta Naik said that several innocent people have been killed on suspicion of being police informers. Neither the State government is taking steps to contain crime, nor is it reviewing the report of the House Committee, Naik alleged.
The State government needs to be extra vigilant as the law and order situation has gone for a toss, added Naik.
Senior Congress leader, Narasingha Mishra said, “I have advised Odisha government to adopt Uttar Pradesh Model- for police modernisation. The State government should take steps to arrange Rs 4,000 crore to implement the model, which is being followed by several States.”
However, CM Naveen stated that the overall law and order and crime situation in the State had remained largely under control.
According to Patnaik, the situation relating to Left wing extremism has improved substantially during the last few years. Only a few pockets in the hilly and difficult terrains and those bordering Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh remained the areas of concern, he said and added, 19 hardcore CPI (Maoist) cadres were killed in 2018 and 7 this year.
Maintaining that protection of women, children and weaker sections is top priorities of the government, he said specialised investigation units for dealing with crimes against women have been constituted in 29 districts in addition to women and children desks and integrated anti-human trafficking Units.
He said all rape cases involving minors were being treated as red-flag cases for better monitoring of investigation, leading to increase in conviction rate.