By our correspondent, Gandhinagar, 13 August 2013

Chief Minister Narendra Modi today announced that the 7 new districts, as promised earlier, will start functioning from the 67th Independence Day in the State. He said this is a step towards making the administrative functions pro-people and decentralized.

Giving the details on the development about new districts to come up from 67th Independence Day, spokespersons of the state, ministers Shri Nitinbhai Patel and Shri Saurabh Patel said the decision about reformation and creation of new districts and talukas was conceived by Chief Minister Narendra Modi to accommodate the rise in population, pace of development and people’s aspirations, and now these new districts will come into existence from this Independence Day. This will mark the fulfillment of the decision and promise made by chief minister. Before this, the proposal was duly studied and worked upon by the committee headed by Chief Secretary of the State to accommodate the representation of the people and opinion of district collectors, and later on it was presented before the sub-committee of the ministers.

Under the guidance of Revenue Minister Smt. Anandiben Patel, the revenue department has completed the process of formation of new seven districts and its administrative arrangements. The sub-committee of the ministers has already accepted the same in-principle and after this chief minister has formally announced the newly formed districts and its headquarters. With this the total number of districts in the state will become 33 instead of 26 from this August 15th.

The spokespersons said that as announced earlier by the chief minister, the process for reformation and creation of new talukas is already on and will be announced after considering all-round aspects of the public representations for the same. At present there are 225 talukas in the state.

The new districts will reduced the distance for local people to reach district headquarters and it has tried to strike a balance keeping in view the population of the district to offer facilities to the people. The ministers further said that with this new set-up of districts the state has attempted to make the administration more convenient, decentralized, pro-people and more inclusive for the local people.

The Revenue Minister has given proper thought and made arrangements so that the administration in these new districts functions properly. Meanwhile, the top officials like collectors, district development officers and district superintendents of police from the existing districts will take the charge of newly formed districts with immediate effect and start functioning with minimum setup from their existing offices. In the first phase, based on requirements the offices will be started on a rented place. The basic needs like staff, office equipments, electronic instruments and IT facility, arising out after formation of new districts are under consideration for budgetary allocations. Different department heads are already informed to start function their offices in respective districts.

New districts will be helpful in resolving the issued faced by local people and will give a new fillip to state’s all-round development making it more result oriented and pro-people in coming days, said the ministers.