Union Home Minister Amit Shah will chair the 27th Eastern Zonal Council meeting in Ranchi today. The meeting will be attended by 70 delegates from four eastern states – Jharkhand, Bihar, Odisha, and West Bengal. Chief Minister Mohancharan Manjhi, Deputy CM Parvati Parida, Minister Mukesh Mahalingam will represent Odisha, Deputy Chief Minister Samrat Chaudhary and Minister Vijay Chaudhary will represent Bihar, and West Bengal will be represented by Minister Chandrika Bhattacharya in the meeting. Hemant Soren, Chief Minister of Jharkhand, along with the Chief Secretary, Home Secretary, DGP and other officials, will represent Jharkhand.
Akashvani Correspondent reports that Union Minister Amit Shah reached Ranchi yesterday night amid tight security measures to chair the 27th Eastern Zonal Council (EZC) Meeting. The Eastern Zonal Council meeting will address various issues, including the swift investigation of sexual offence cases and the establishment of fast-track special courts for quick resolution. Discussions will also focus on providing banking facilities in every village and implementing the Emergency Response Support System. Other agendas include discussion on pending inter-state issues among Bihar, Odisha, and West Bengal, and a review of progress on decisions taken in previous council meetings. More than 20 agendas have been prepared by the State government to discuss strengthening sectors like education, health, electricity, urban planning, and the cooperative system. Meanwhile, the Jharkhand government can also push the demand for pending dues of Rs 1.36 lakh crore from the royalty of coal mines from the Centre. Jharkhand government will also seek restoration of Security Related Expenditure (SRE) funding in 14 districts that were earlier classified as Left-Wing Extremism (LWE) affected but have since been removed from the list, leading to discontinuation of SRE support. The issues of sharing of assets and liabilities with Bihar and water sharing with West Bengal are also likely to be discussed in the meeting.
