Union of Minister of State (Independent Charge) Youth Affairs and Sports, Vijay Goel today stopped short of rejecting outright the site proposed by Okram Ibobi Singh government for construction of national Sports University.
After inspecting the site at Yaithbi Loukon in Ibobi Singh’s district of Thoubal the Union minister told reporters that the site selected by the state government is not suitable for the university. He cited four reasons to disfavor the site.
“The site is located at a low lying area. There are law and order problems there. There are disputes over the land acquisition and the land owners are not paid compensation,” Vijay Goel told reporters at a media briefing at the BJP head office here.
He said the state government should provide the required dispute free land and the delay in setting up the National Sports University due to identification of the site will be the sole responsibility of the state government.
He said that he went to Toubal district and visited the Yaithibi area and he was appraised by his joint secretary Rajvir Singh that the land is a low lying area, plus there were more than a hundred litigations pending in the court and the land acquisition is not complete.
“The area is low lying, it is not feasible to build on a flood prone area plus there are protests and the law and order situation is not feasible for setting up the proposed university,” he reiterated.
The Minister further said that he went to Koutruk area in Imphal West which is another viable site for setting up the university along with the chief minister. “We want to set up a world class university, but if the state government does not identify the site, the Centre can not go ahead with the project. I don’t know what the intention of the state government is,” he added.
The present governance has 15 years in its bag to bring about holistic development, but there are more problems than development.
“I drove along the Koutruk road today. I don’t know where the road begins and where the ditches and potholes end. If two riding on a two wheeler, a need is there to check every two minutes if the pillion rider is still there or not,” he mused.
He mentioned about the problems of public welfare and lack of employment in the state.
The Minister announced that the sports ministry will open a sports talent search web portal where every talented child above 8 years can get sponsorship by uploading a video to the portal. This is in furtherance of pivoting the sports sector of the country and for transparency in the selection process, he said.
Source: Imphal Free Press
