Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who is eyeing at record sixth term and becoming longest serving CM of India, said the past five years had been based on the principles of 5T (Team work, Technology, Transparency, Transformation and Time limit), which history would remember as a milestone marked by remarkable changes achieved within a short period of time.
Addressing his last Cabinet meeting of his fifth term on March 16, Mr. Patnaik said, “The last five years have been based on the principles of 5T. History will remember this period as a milestone which put Odisha on a firm path of transformation and prosperity for its people. Transformation is visible across the State and across every segment of the population.”
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The Odisha CM reminded of State’s deft handling of disasters which came in shape of extremely severe cyclonic storm, ‘Fani’ in May 2019 and COVID-19, once in a century pandemic in 2020-2022.
“The State faced a rare summer cyclone first in 43 years. It hit the State with wind speeds of 280 kmph causing extensive damage. Thanks to our dedicated and diligent community-based disaster management systems, we faced the cyclone courageously and our relief measures started immediately after the cyclone storm passed. Similarly, Odisha was comparatively well prepared and emerged as a model in Covid management,” he narrated.
Mr. Patnaik mentioned about four flagship development programmes, which were executed at a significant pace. Those include Biju Swasthya Kalyan Yojana (BSKY), Mission Shakti, sports infrastructure development and transformation of schools.
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“Today we are spending ₹3,500 crore every year under BSKY. The health infrastructure has also undergone a massive transformation with modern hospitals and medical colleges,” he said.
“In women’s empowerment, our Mission Shakti (women self-help group) members have set a unique example in the country. Fuelled by zero interest loans up to ₹10 lakh, SHGs are fast converting to SMEs in every sector. About ₹40,000 crore bank linkage has been provided to SHGs in the last five years with ₹15,000 core in this financial year alone,” Odisha CM spoke highly about SHG movement in the State.
With regards to sports infrastructure development, he said, “Modern sports facilities are being set up across the State. The world’s largest seated hockey stadium, created in 15 months, in Rourkela is a case study in project management. Odisha has become the sports capital of India.”
Stating that probably, nowhere in the world such a large number of schools had been transformed in such a short time, he said, “High schools were transformed with smart classrooms, e-libraries, science laboratories, computer centre and sports facilities. As a next step, we have started the transformation of the colleges across the State.”
Odisha CM also talked about on fast-paced industrialisation, state-of-the-art irrigation projects, formation of special development councils for tribal development with allocation of more than ₹400 crore, minimum support price for forest produces, improvement of bus connectivity with priority to women in remote areas and financial inclusion.
Development of religious institutions including Shree Jagannath Temple, Puri, Maa Samalei Temple, Sambalpur and other such campuses figured in his last Cabinet speech.
