Set up board for regional infra development: Haryana CM

Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar urged the Union Ministries of Home Affairs and Housing and Urban Affairs for the setting up of a statutory empowered board to facilitate development of regional infrastructure.

He said this would meet the growing aspirations of the residents of tri-city of Panchkula, Mohali and Chandigarh and also ensure effective coordination on the pattern of NCR Planning Board.

Khattar was speaking at 29th meeting of the Northern Zonal Council organised here. Haryana was the host for the meeting.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Jammu and Kashmir Governor Satya Pal Malik, Punjab Governor and Administrator of Chandigarh V.P. Singh Badnore, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur and Lt Governor of Delhi Anil Baijal, among others, were present at the meeting.

Khattar said there was a clear need for having an institutional arrangement for enhancing mutual coordination on various issues. The most critical of these was responding to the growing urban character and meeting the growing aspirations of the residents of the tri-city.

The Chief Minister said though Haryana is relatively a small state, it made significant contributions to the Indian economy.

On the construction of the crucial Sutlej Yamuna Link (SYL) canal, the lifeline of Haryana, Khattar said memorandum of understandings (MoUs) for Renuka and Lakhwar-Vyasi dams on the Yamuna river and its tributaries have been signed.

For this, he thanked the government of India and the state governments. He hoped that MoU for Kishau dam would also be entered into soon and added early construction of these projects would help ease the enormous water stress faced by Haryana.

Against the demand of 36 million acre feet (MAF) water, the availability is only 14.7 MAF.

He said despite this Haryana was giving extra water to Delhi in compliance of the apex court's orders from its share of Yamuna waters despite Punjab was not delivering Haryana's full share of the Ravi-Beas water.

The supplies of water from the Yamuna have been dwindling over the recent years and it was most unfortunate that more than a thousand villages in Haryana and millions of hectares of land are still bereft of water.

Emphasizing the need to jointly fight against the drug menace, he said it has been decided to set up an inter-state drug information secretariat in Panchkula town to which all participant states have since appointed their modal officers.

The Chief Minister said the deliberations in this meeting would help the states resolving all outstanding issues of the northern zone and help them towards building a modern, strong and prosperous India.

( With inputs from IANS )