Pioneer: Agami Orissa to gherao Parliament to protest shifting of IIT

Agami Orissa to gherao Parliament to protest shifting of IIT

Pioneer News Service | Bhubaneswar Agami Orissa, which has been at loggerheads with the Union Human Resource Development Ministry for its step-motherly attitude towards Orissa, on Thursday announced to gherao the Parliament and stage a demonstration in New Delhi if the decision for setting up of an IIT in the State is reversed. "We will stage a demonstration here involving all the students' community and after that a protest rally will be conducted at New Delhi against the conspiracy of the HRD Ministry," Agami Orissa convener Santosh Tripathy said.

With the help of students, teachers and intellectuals of the State, the Organisation would launch mass mobilisation rally in order to gain public support, he said.

The decision to shift the proposed IIT to Andhra Pradesh has proved the anti- Orissa attitude of the Central Government, Tripathy said adding that all should strongly oppose the move.

It might be noted here that earlier on October 2006, the Minister of State for Human Resource Development MAA Fatmi had announced in Patna that two IITs would be set up in Bihar and Orissa, which had made the people of the State buoyant. But the Ministry had reversed its announcement within a few days.

Meanwhile, extending its full support to the agitation call by the Agami Orissa, State unit of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad also turned the decision due to the Congress Party's age-old negligence against Orissa.

Parishad national zonal organising secretary Bishnu Das threatened that the Parishad would launch a statewide agitation against the Union HRD Ministry. "It was not the first case, earlier the Centre had promised for a NIS, but when the Left Parties mounted pressure, it was shifted to Kolkata and now both the Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav and Andhra Pradesh Government are mounting pressure," Das said adding Orissa has to wait for justice.