It is yet another example of tall talks falling flat — courtesy Assam government.
Although the Assam government had started a Prabasi Asomiya Kendra (meaning Centre for Assamese people living outside) ahead of the much-hyped Advantage Assam Summit, yet the centre remains non-functional even after two years of its ceremonial opening.
After two years of inauguration of the centre, which was inaugurated by Assam industry and commerce minister Chandra Mohan Patowary himself on July 18, 2017, the centre today is existing just with one thing — its signboard.
Minister Patowary on Monday admitted that only one or two Assamese businessmen living in Bengaluru registered with the centre in 2017 and nothing has happened after that.
It may be mentioned here that after inauguration of the centre, Assam chief minister and his cabinet colleagues had led delegations to foreign countries to meet the Assamese Diaspora and also to encourage them to investment in Assam spending huge crores of money from the state exchequer.
“We met the Assamese Diaspora living abroad and appealed them to register with the Prabasi Asomiya Kendra. However, the response was not good. Few of them from Bengaluru responded and registered but the rest did not,” said Patowary in reply to a quarry by Northeast Now on Monday.
The minister, however, forgot that there was no contact details ever attached to Prabasi Asomiya Kendra to be availed by the Assamese Diaspora living abroad.
The centre till today neither has a website nor any email ID.
The only mention about Prabasi Asomiya Kendra could be found in one of the web pages of www.advantageassam.com and contact details of the then general manager of Assam Industrial Development Corporation (AIDC), Geetimala Baishya, who has retired long time back.
Asked about this, the minister could only reply: “I am not aware of this…I am going to take it up today itself.”
Interestingly, in the web page, there are three spellings in the name of the centre in three places – Prabasi Asomiya Kendra, Pravasi Axomiya Kendra and Prabasi Axomiya Kendra.