Chief Minister Conrad Sangma on Saturday slammed Union Minister of State (MoS) – minority affairs John Barla for his comment on the Government inaugurating incomplete PA Sangma stadium and said it is unfortunate that low level comments are made.
“Unfortunate to make stadium as election issue .Sad to see when development comes, people are criticised. There will be central funds for projects but it is unfortunate that low level comments are made”, Sangma said.
The project comes with a price tag of over Rs 127 crores with 90% of the funding coming from the centre and the rest to be borne by the state. The stadium was funded by the ministry of minority affairs.
The minister during his visit to Garo Hills conducted an inspection of the stadium in Tura. He pointed out that this project was funded by the centre but was inaugurated by the Chief Minister and there is not even a mention in any part of the compound. The stadium has not even completed yet but they have already inaugurated it. This is a political gimmick, Barla said.
Reacting to this, Conrad told reporters that certain leaders are raising the issue especially when people long for development.
“It looks like those leaders who mentioned this especially the local leaders who have mentioned this are people who don’t want development to come to Tura, Garo Hills and the state and it is very unfortunate”, he said.
When asked, the chief minister said that the project has two sections – the first section is the football stadium and the second section is an indoor stadium.
Further, clarified that the Indoor stadium is yet to start and hence only the first part of the football stadium has been completed.
“It would have been inappropriate for us to call the central minister without finishing the second part. But since the first part has been completed if you do not inaugurate it cannot be used and hence if it is not inaugurated and kept it will get spoiled. Therefore, keeping in mind that the project was not fully completed in the sense that the second part of the indoor stadium has not yet started, it was not appropriate for us to call the central minister. Hence, as chief minister of the state, I inaugurated it and this happens in many programmes. For example today we inaugurated JJM schemes everywhere but it is not possible for us to call the minister for JJM from the Center for everything,” Conrad added.
He said there was no question of the beams being bent.