GUWAHATI, June 18 � The Bhartatiya Janata Party (BJP), Assam, today underscored the need for utilising the water of the Brahmaputra in an effective way through multi-purpose big dams to counter the growing Chinese interventions on the river in Tibet.
The BJP was also severely critical of the Government of India�s �weak response� to the Chinese moves on the Brahmaputra some of which were already under implementation in a clandestine manner.
Addressing a press conference, BJP State president Ranjit Dutta said that the party was concerned with the large-scale Chinese designs involving massive diversion of the water of the Brahmaputra which could have far-reaching untoward implications for India�s North-east.
�The Centre needs to take up the matter with its Chinese counterparts in a firm manner at the earliest rather than issuing unconvincing statements time to time. At the same time, there should be effective utilization of the Brahmaputra's water in the North-east by way of multi-purpose big dams with provisions for irrigation and flood control besides generation of electricity,� Dutta said.
All-party team to Delhi: The Guwahati Senior Citizens� Association (GSCA) has urged Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi to take an all-party delegation to New Delhi to impress upon the Government of India about the vital need for foiling the �sinister designs� of the Chinese Government to dry up Indian rivers which would affect vast tracts of land in the North-east by blocking regular supply of water.
The association, in its meeting today held under the presidentship of senior journalist DN Chakravarty threatened to launch a mass agitation unless the entire process of the 'Chinese conspiracy' was foiled by the Government of India.
The meeting also strongly opposed the surreptitious attempts of the State administration to install the statue of Rajiv Gandhi at the rotary near TC High School. It suggested that the rotary should be decorated by installing the statue of Lokapriya Gopinath Bordoloi after whose name that stretch of road had been named.
The association warned the State Government to refrain from dishonouring the public sentiment of Guwahatians in particular and the State as a whole.
