The Assam cabinet on Friday undertook a fresh reorganisation of districts in the state, creating four new ones which were abolished earlier. The cabinet, chaired by chief minister Himanata Biswa Sarma, also named 81 new sub-districts. With this, the state will now have 34 districts.
The move comes two weeks after the Election Commission (EC) issued a final delimitation order for the 126 assembly and 14 Lok Sabha seats in the state, which saw large-scale redrawing of many constituencies in both categories.
On December 31, a day ahead of the EC deadline for starting the delimitation exercise, the state government abolished four districts namely– Biswanath, Hojai, Bajali and Tamulpur and merged them with existing ones and redrawn boundaries of 14 areas across the state.
“Since the delimitation process is over, the four districts will be functional again. But their boundaries have been reorganised as per the delimitation exercise,” CM Sarm said after his government’s 100th cabinet meeting.
The new sub-districts will become operational from January 1, 2024, but notification regarding their creation will be issued within the next few days, CM Sarma added.
“From now there will be no sub-divisions in Assam. Instead, we will have circles and sub-districts in each district. The sub-districts will be headed by additional district commissioners and will have all relevant government departments,” said Sarma.
{{/usCountry}}“From now there will be no sub-divisions in Assam. Instead, we will have circles and sub-districts in each district. The sub-districts will be headed by additional district commissioners and will have all relevant government departments,” said Sarma.
{{/usCountry}}The CM further stated that the creation of new administrative units would require more posts, and the government would advertise 22,000 new jobs next month to fill vacancies in the new districts and sub-districts.
MODI Swaccha Zila Puraskar:
The Assam chief minister also said that the cabinet has decided to introduce the ‘Swaccha Zila Puraskar’, or Most Outstanding District Initiative (MODI), which will be given annually to the cleanest district in the state.
The cleanest district will receive a grand prize of Rs.100 crore, said Sarma, adding the criteria will include garbage disposal, sewage treatment, and reach of clean drinking water, among others on which the districts will be judged.
“We will come up with the list of criteria and other details soon and districts will be evaluated on 108 parameters to be considered for the top prize,” the CM added.
Sarma further informed that since coming to power in May 2021, his cabinet has taken 1,238 decisions in 99 meetings held prior to Friday and of them 1,217 (or nearly 98%) have been fully or partially implemented till date.