BERHAMPUR: Empowerment of women is imminent for development of the society and State, said Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.Addressing a public gathering at the Khalikote University stadium in the city on Saturday, he said several development programmes are being implemented in the State for welfare of women. He informed that reservation of 33 per cent for women in State Assembly has been approved.
On a whirlwind tour of the city, Naveen inaugurated several projects worth Rs 300 crores and laid foundation stones for many others. He inaugurated the Biju Patnaik Adarsha Vidyalaya (BPAV) at Palur Hills. The BPAV is a mega urban educational complex for Scheduled Tribe students having an overall capacity for 1,500 students. It is a fully residential school with state of the art facilities for academics and extracurricular activities. Students have been admitted from 2018-19 academic session and will follow CBSE pattern curriculum.
The Chief Minister said the State Government is committed to provide the best educational facilities to the ST and SC students. Currently, the State Government operates around 4300 residential schools, with more than 6400 hostels providing residential accommodation to 6 lakh students, which is the highest in the country.
The State Government has also sanctioned 100 new hostels for providing residential facilities to 10,000 OBC/SEBC students while 40 new hostels with an overall housing capacity for 4,000 students have been sanctioned for minority students, he added.
Naveen laid foundation stone for two 500 bed OBC hostels for boys and girls and a 200-bed hostel for minority students at Karapalli village. He also inaugurated new HRD Centre building, library annex building, a new academic block at Berhampur University.
He said Odisha has been able to carve a niche for itself in the global arena by successfully hosting the Hockey World Cup. He added that over `4 lakh crore investment proposals have been received through Make In Odisha conclave that would create job opportunities for around 5 lakh unemployed youths.
Accompanied by Ministers Ramesh Majhi, Suryanarayana Patra, Bikram Keshari Arukh, Usha Devi and MLAs of Ganjam district, the Chief Minister inaugurated Berhampur-Gopalpur railway over bridge, new building of District Tourist Office, Berhampur Academic-cum-Workshop building and new building of Mahila Police Station. Police detained some BJP activists in wake of the Chief Minister’s programme.