Sanjay Jaju takes charge as Secretary, Ministry of I&B

Staff Reporter

Shillong, Feb 5: Sanjay Jaju has today assumed charge as Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.

He is a 1992-batch IAS officer from Telangana cadre. Upon his assumption of charge, he was welcomed by outgoing Secretary, Apurva Chandra and other officials of the Ministry and various media units. Apurva Chandra has been assigned the charge of Secretary, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

Jaju has earlier served as Additional Secretary to Government of India from 2018 to 2023 and Director, National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited from October 2014 to March 2018.

He has served as Secretary to Govt of Andhra Pradesh (Electronics, IT and Communications Department) from May 2011 to October 2014.

Ronnie backs use of paperless proceedings in Legislative Assembly

Staff Reporter

Shillong, Feb 5: Leader of Opposition Ronnie V Lyngdoh today said that he is on board with the use of the National eVidhan Application (NeVA) to make the proceedings of the Meghalaya Legislative Assembly seamless and paperless.

The Opposition Leader received training today on using the application by officials from the IT Cell of the Meghalaya Legislative Assembly Secretariat at the Conference Hall of the Administrative Block of the Meghalaya Assembly in Khyndailad, Police Bazar.

Lyngdoh expressed his appreciation to the Meghalaya Assembly Speaker, Thomas A Sangma, and officials of the Meghalaya Legislative Assembly Secretariat for initiating the implementation of the National eVidhan Application. He emphasized that this initiative can play a meaningful role in environment conservation.

He also pointed out the efficiency of the Application as it can be used to submit questions and notices anywhere on the go.

It may be mentioned that the application hosts a secure page for each Member of the House for submitting questions and other notices.

NeVA, deployed on the NIC Cloud MeghRaj, is a workflow system designed to facilitate the smooth conduct of House proceedings by the Chair, and conduct Legislative Business in a paperless manner and assist Hon’ble Members of the Legislative Assembly to carry out their duties in the House.

NeVA is a device-neutral and member-centric application created to equip them to handle diverse House Businesses smartly by putting entire information regarding member contact details, rules of procedure, list of business, notices, bulletins, bills, starred/unstarred questions and answers, papers laid, committee reports etc. in their handheld devices/ tablets and equip all Legislatures/ Departments to handle it efficiently. NeVA will completely eliminate the process of sending out a notice/request for the collection of data.

Umiam wetlands home to 155 water birds

Staff Reporter

Shillong, Feb 5: There are over 155 water birds found in the wetland areas of Umiam Lake, Ri Bhoi District.

This was as per the Asian Waterbird Census, 2024 conducted by the Meghalaya Forest & Environment Department through the office of the Divisional Forest Officer, Khasi Hills Wildlife Division Shillong in Collaboration with The Meghalaya Biodiversity Board on February 2.

The exercise was simultaneously conducted at Umsaw, Umbir, Umniuh, Mawlyndep & Umiam covering the wetland areas of Umiam Lake, Ri-Bhoi District, Meghalaya with the support and guidance from professionals.

H Lato, IFS, DFO Social Forestry Division, M Kharsyntiew, MFS, Assistant Conservator of Forests, from NGOs like Aaranyak (Dr) Dipankar Lahkar and  Pranjal Deka, experts from Meghalaya Biodiversity Board (Dr) E. Khongwir and (Dr) S Dey also participated in the programme.

During the exercise about 155 numbers of water birds comprising of 13 species.

The Asian Waterbird Census (AWC) is part of the global International Waterbird Census (IWC). This citizen-science programme supporting the conservation and management of wetlands and waterbirds worldwide is done yearly between January and February, wherein, volunteers across Asia and Australasia visit wetlands in their country and count waterbirds. It works in partnership with many existing national waterbird census programmes.

This day is also celebrated throughout the world as “World Wetland Day ” and the census was carried out to also commemorate this day to protect and preserve the pristine wetlands which act as a habitat for this avian life every year during their migration period. Through the exercise, it has been observed that the Umiam Wetland acts as an important habitat for this avian life.

Meghalaya CM underscores importance of the youth

Staff Reporter

Shillong, Feb 5: Chief Minister, Conrad K Sangma felicitated the Sports Achievers of Meghalaya Games 2024 and Khelo India Youth Games 2024 at a function that was held at U Soso Tham Auditorium, Shillong. Also present during the occasion were Minister of Health & Family Welfare etc Ampareen Lyngdoh and Minister of Sports & Youth Affairs, Shakliar Warjri. 

During the felicitation function, Chief Minister, Conrad K Sangma, congratulating the achievers, said that the achievements and laurels brought to the state must be celebrated. “This week is an important week and throughout the week we will be celebrating our youth in Sports, Entrepreneurship, and Music and every activity we are having this week is connected to the youth,” he said. 

He further informed that the idea of felicitating and recognizing the achievements of the youth is to project them as Icons and Motivators for others. “I want to tell the youth who are here today that you have an important and responsible role and it is not just about winning a medal or getting an award but becoming exemplary and role models,” he said. 

The Chief Minister also expressed gratitude to the MSOA, the different sports associations and the Sports department for their contribution towards the success of the Meghalaya Games. “There were challenges but every year we are ensuring that the games become better and we overcome the challenges,” he added. 

Congratulating the Football Team that had won the cup in the Khelo India Youth Games the Chief Minister said that the team has made the State proud and added, “They have come out as champions and this only goes to show the kind of talent that we have and what we can achieve if we are focused and determined,” he concluded. 

Earlier, Minister, of Sports & Youth Affairs, Shakliar Warjri reminded the athletes to use the Cash Award wisely to further their skill and talent in the Sports they have excelled. 

“We as a government acknowledge the hard work that you have put in to win the medal but this is not the end, aim to achieve greater heights because you are the future of our state,” he said. 

Later the dignitaries distributed Cash Awards to medal winners in different disciplines.

Indian Army invites youth of Meghalaya to join as Agniveer

Staff Reporter

Shillong, Jan 27: The Indian Army has invited online applications from the youth of the all districts of Meghalaya for selection as Agniveers under the Agnipath scheme. The window for online registration will commence from the first week of Feb 2024 onwards. The recruitment will be carried out in two phases.

(a)  Phase –I.     Online Computer Based Written Examination (Online CEE) will be conducted at selected centres in the State.

(b)  Phase-II.     Recruitment Rally will be conducted for selected candidates (shortlisted) who make it to the merit list in online Common Entrance Examination.

The candidates can register online on Join Indian Army website www.joinindianarmy.nic.in where they can check their eligibility criteria and create a personal profile. The candidates on successful filling the application will be directed to SBI portal through a link on the website to make payment of Rs 250/- plus bank charges as applicable. The payment can be made through various payment options like Debit/Credit cards, online banking of UPI. Candidates will be required to have an active email & mobile number which will be used for further communication by Indian Army. Candidates will have to select five choices for the exam centre. Candidates will need to enter Aadhaar number in online application and are therefore are advised to link Aadhaar to their mobile number. To provide candidates practice on online CEE as per their category, a category wise link has been provided on “Join Indian Army” website. Candidates are advised to carry out practice at least once before appearing for actual CEE. Animated videos on “How to Register” & “How to Appear for online CEE” are also available on www.joinindianarmy.nic.in. The helpline numbers of Army Recruitment Office Shillong are 0364-2504177, email: rohqshillong@gmail.com. Candidates can also raise any kind of query on www.joinindianarmy.nic.in for necessary clarifications.

TGCSU urges power minister to reduce load shedding hours

The Tura Government College Students’ Union (TGCSU) on Friday requested the Power Minister Abu Taher Mondal to reduce the hours of load shedding in view of students preparing and writing their semester examinations.

In a statement, TGCSU president Anand Ch Momin said that the union feels that it is not advisable to have long hours of load shedding as it is going to have a bad impact on the studies of the students.

“Having more than 10-15 hours of load shedding is unbearable, especially during summer not only for students but the person of any age. We would like to make an appeal to the power minister to make amends to the load shedding hours and reduce the hours considering also the fact that students are preparing and writing their exams as well,” he said. 

Conrad inspects upgrade of JN stadium

Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Wednesday inspected the ongoing renovation, up-gradation and expansion of the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium at Polo in Shillong.

The renovated stadium would include a football ground with natural grass turf and also a state-of-the-art facility for hosting track and field events.

Laying emphasis on the quality of the construction, the Chief Minister informed that the highest quality standards are being maintained and once ready will be fit to host international sporting events.

“The entire arrangements and the way the work is going on, we are going to meet the FIFA standards and this particular stadium and the football field will be at par to host any international games in the future”, he said.

“Apart from this, the stadium will have full facilities for athletics and the quality that is being maintained here for the track and field is also top of the line”, he added.

The Chief Minister the renovated stadium will have a seating capacity of close to 30,000 and will be completed by the month of December this year.

Adjacent to the Football Stadium, a multipurpose indoor stadium is also being constructed.

The Chief Minister informed that it will be the largest multipurpose indoor stadium in the Northeastern region. The indoor stadium will have facilities for different disciplines such as basketball, squash, badminton, table tennis, volleyball, etc.

Expressing his happiness at the progress of the work, the Chief Minister was optimistic that once the state-of-the-art facilities are completed it will provide an opportunity for the youth of the State to excel in the respective field and sporting disciplines.

During his visit, the Chief Minister also inspected the football field located at the first ground Polo. Necessary upgrade and expansion are being carried out to improve the ground with the laying of an artificial turf and the construction of new stands.

Stating that the youth of the State are passionate about football, the Chief Minister said that the Government is in the process to identify local practice grounds across the State and take steps to upgrade and improve the selected grounds for the benefit of football lovers.

“The Government has decided that we are going to take up different locality fields and football grounds in all parts of the State where our youth normally play football and in collaboration with the community and the local leaders we would want to upgrade these grounds with better facilities”.

“We are already surveying Shillong city and we have identified five locations where we can potentially lay these astro turfs. With this intervention we are expecting that a large number of astro turf football grounds will come up, where our youth can practise, have matches. That will be one of the steps towards ensuring that we are able to bring out the talent and give the opportunity for the youth who are passionate about football”, he said.

The ongoing construction of an Integrated Hospitality and Sports Complex at JN Stadium is at a cost of 125 crore, while the upgrade of JN Sports Complex Phase I is at a cost of 34.75 crore, while the upgrade of Phase II is 18.2 crore and the upgrade of SSA ground at 14.81 crore.

The integrated sports complex will comprise of 700-seater Multi Sports Hall, Convention Hall that can house 12 badminton courts, an independent Banquet hall with a dedicated kitchen facility, 200 seater Basketball or Futsal Indoor Sports Hall,  Indoor Sports Hall for Squash (2 Nos.) and Table tennis (10 Nos.), 10 M and 25 M Shooting range.