By Arun Pratap Singh
Dehradun, 23 Nov: Former Chief Minister and State Congress Election Campaign Committee President Harish Rawat has now advocated the formation of a 21-member Legislative Council in Uttarakhand. He has claimed that the formation of a legislative council in Uttarakhand would lend political stability. This idea was shared by him on his twitter account today. He added in his tweet that, yesterday, he had spoken in favour of a legislative council and, today, he was making clear that it is his personal opinion. He added that it was also his personal opinion that, to lend more political stability in Uttarakhand, the district panchayats, the block panchayats and the Gram Panchayats be given greater autonomy and rights.
Rawat said that, from the first day of the formation of Uttarakhand state, political instability had prevailed and, in the absence of stability, development could not be ensured. He stressed that political instability was the order of the day, here, in the past 21 years ever since the formation of the state and, therefore, the state could not witness adequate development. He admitted that there were so many leaders in each political party that it became difficult to adjust them in positions of power and coordinate with them, which caused the political instability.
He pointed out that, due to the decision of the Union Government to fix the number of cabinet positions, small states were facing problems. In a state like Uttarakhand only 12 ministers could be appointed. The fact remained that even the smaller states have just as many departments as the bigger states and, as a result, each minister is forced to hold charge of several departments which was not easy.
He reminded that, in the Congress manifesto of 2002, he had promised to constitute a Legislative Council. Due to some reasons, it could not be done then. However, this could be done now in the greater interests of the state.
