Assam Cabinet on Saturday decided to create a new department to protect the culture and practices of people belonging to the state’s tribal and other indigenous communities.
Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the new department – Indigenous Faith & Culture – is being created for the preservation and protection of indigenous faith and culture.
“The new department will be an independent department. The Assam cabinet has requested the finance minister to allocate a substantial budget for the new department in the upcoming state budget,” CM Himanta Biswa Sarma said, adding, “Assam’s first woman finance minister will table the state budget in the assembly on July 16.”
Special standing finance headed by the finance minister will be approving projects that are worth anything between Rs 5 crore and Rs 100 crore, and only the cabinet gets to give a go-ahead to schemes that involve funds over Rs 100 crore, he added.
Sarma also announced a number of financial reforms. He said that while department heads can green signal projects and schemes worth Rs 2 crore and below, a standing finance committee headed by chief secretary, will take the call on projects worth Rs 2 crore to Rs 5 crore.
“Apart from that, those between Rs 5 crore and Rs 100 crore will be looked at by a special standing finance committee headed by the finance minister and for projects over Rs 100 crore, only the cabinet can give the go-ahead,” he added.
Sarma further stated that in the coming months, legislations related to population control, cow protection, and marriage will be brought in by the government. “You can expect some big announcements in our budget towards population control with regard to things like voluntary sterilisation. All this will be notified in a month,” he said.
He also said that a marriage law will be introduced. “This won’t be like a love jihad law…I don’t believe in the word. It will apply to all faiths. Even Hindus can cheat Hindus…this [law] is not just against Muslims,” he said.
Assembly has already passed a resolution on the population policy, he added. CM Himanta Biswa Sarma went on to say, “We are distributing schemes in three ways one is the basic scheme which will be availed by everybody, irrespective of the number of children like Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, it will be for all. However, if we start a housing scheme, we may say it will be for up to two children. There will be some basic schemes which will be open for all and there will be some other schemes which will be open for only those with two-children.”
“Some big announcements will be made in the next state budget towards population control,” said the Assam Chief Minister.
He told reporters, “Uttar Pradesh is trying to do it [policy on population] through an Act, and we have done that through a resolution in the assembly.”
