IMPHAL, June 21 - Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh today said that the restrictions on financial transactions on the State Government, which were imposed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), would be lifted soon as the overdrafts have been neutralised.
Earlier, the RBI had banned all transactions from the account of the Manipur Government from the second week of June for having overdrawn in excess of arrangements agreed upon with the bank.
The Chief Minister said he had apprised Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman of the current financial position in the State, and requested them to release open market borrowings to overcome the current situation.
Subsequently, the Union Ministry of Finance issued permission, directing the RBI to raise open market borrowings of the State up to Rs 795 crore.
For the time being, the State is borrowing Rs 400 crore from the open market to neutralise the current overdraft, he said. The Government is also expecting to receive a sum of Rs 305 crore as the State share of Central taxes soon. The State had faced an overdraft of Rs 247.48 crore.
Later today, the Chief Minister, accompanied by ministers and high-level officials, inspected the ongoing works on the ambitious project to prevent pollution of the Nambul river here. The project called �Rejuvenation and Conservation of Nambul River�, which aims at controlling pollution of the river by intercepting and treating urban waste through a water treatment plant, MBBR (Moving Bed Bio Reactor), was launched on March 9.
The State Directorate of Environment is implementing the Rs 97.72-crore project under the National River Conservation Plan of the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change.
Fifty-four eco-friendly crematoria and 20 toilet complexes will be constructed across 14 municipality wards along the river which flows into the Loktak Lake.
