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Title: Need to set up a permanent camp of C.R.P.F at Aurangabad, Bihar.
SHRI NIKHIL KUMAR (AURANGABAD, BIHAR): Bihar is the least urbanized of our states as nearly 90% of its total area is rural and this contributes in a big way to its backwardness. So backward is it that its State Domestic Product had grown at the rate of just 5.08% in the last decade. This is a matter of much concern because if we have to achieve a national growth rate of over 10% up to 2019-20 then even the states, including Bihar, will have to contribute. Bihar’s annual growth rate will have to be 15% and, for this, it will require an annual investment of Rs. 38, 500 crores.
Aurangabad is very backward but there is scope and need for such investment there and it must be given close attention for it to develop. But the long and bloody history of Naxal violence in that area is a big deterrent to investment. To encourage prospective investors the union Home Minister had, on my request, directed that without avoidable delay a permanent camp of a CRPF battalion be set up in Aurangabad which, incidentally, should also counter the threat of left wing extremism in that area and instill a sense of security ad well being in its people. This proposal was therefore pursued seriously and, after the State Government’s approval the foundation stone of the camp was laid on 29 Nov. 2006. But, unfortunately, there has been no meaningful progress thereafter.
First, the state government has given only twenty acres of land on a mere ten years lease for the permanent CRPF camp while according to the yardstick laid down by the Government of India it should be on forty acres and, normally, the lease should be for thirty years. Secondly, it was expected that pending completion of work on planning of the lay out and construction of the required administrative and residential buildings the CRPF battalion headquarter camp will be set up, as at other places, in temporary structures. But, unfortunately, this has not happened and the required action on this project, which was expected to serve public interest, is being unnecessarily delayed.
It is suggested that the State Government may be persuaded to give the CRPF forty acres of land as per the approved yardstick and this should be on a thirty year-lease. It is also requested that a beginning may be made by setting up the battalion headquarter camp in temporary structures. It is equally important to expedite the work on planning the lay out of the camp area and follow it up by the completion of codal formalities for the construction of pucca structures on it.