Odisha gears up to host 24th Eastern Zonal Council Meet

Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has geared up for the 24^th Eastern Zonal Council (EZC) Meet to be held in Bhubaneswar on February 28.

The 24th EZC Meet will be addressed by Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

The delegates from West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, and Odisha along with high officials from the Government of India would participate in the meet, said an official on Thursday.

Various inter-state concerns along with issues relating to developmental schemes and programs would be deliberated in the meet.

A high-level meeting was held under the chairmanship of chief secretary Asit Tripathy, here on Thursday to review the preparation for the coming EZC Meet.

Reviewing the department wise progress, chief secretary Tripathy directed concerned departments to feed updates status of various issues likely to come up in the meet to the Home department by Thursday afternoon.

Further, he directed that since 24th Eastern Zonal Council meet would be a prestigious inter-state event all the arrangements should be done in the best befitting manner for its smooth carry over.

Sources said the issues relating to adoption of ‘postage stamp method’ for unified power tariff in different states, disaster resilience infrastructure, rail link projects, operation of mines, financial inclusion, grants to Gram Panchayats under 14th Finance Commission, devolution of powers to panchayat bodies, coal royalty, implementation of direct benefit transfer, telecom and internet connectivity, use of Aadhar database, timely release of central grants, etc may figure in the deliberations.