Rising People’s Party (RPP) said that Dimapur, once the fastest growing city in the north east, was left to rot with multiple taxations, filth, drugs, boot legging, traffic woes, syndicate system, crumbling infrastructure and added to these woes, the city was literally flooded on the evening of September 12.
In a statement, RPP held the ruling NDPP-BJP coalition responsible for misplaced priorities when the coalition, instead of nurturing Dimapur, is presently contemplating a mini-city around Chathe Prayer Centre area.
RPP said the “audacity of this announcement is simply incredible” since it did not need rocket science to “fathom who’ll benefit from the works.”
RPP pointed out that regular occurrence of dengue in Dimapur was directly linked to “flooding and clogged drains” and asked the state government to “immediately direct” the district administration to cancel all pattas illegally issued over swamps and sewages besides ordering all illegal structures to be demolished. It also demanded that all the MLAs of Dimapur district to concentrate all their energy in revamping the drainage system.
RPP reminded that the September 12 flooding (waterlogging) on the airport runway was not the first time. It said if land encroachers have obstructed expansion of both the airport and Dimapur railway station, then what was stopping the government from evicting all encroachers?
RPP said it was “simply stunning” that the government was having a “single-minded pursuit” for Chiethu airport at the cost of neglecting Dimapur airport. It said the only conclusion for this pursuit was that “this outrage is nothing else but the pursuit of personal benefits and enrichment”. RPP said if the same determination shown in favour of the proposed Chiethu airport since the past ten years was also applied for a “new Dimapur airport” then Nagaland would be having an international airport by today.
RPP said the responsibility of any government was to take “iron-willed decisions” but lamented that the 14th Nagaland Legislative Assembly had only revealed the limitations of an opposition-less government.
It also expressed appreciation to the few MLAs for raising issues in the just concluded second session of the 14th NLA where points were highlighted on some serious issues which should have been debated by the 60 MLAs.