ADM asked to earmark land for girls’ hostel

Statesman News Service

MALDA, 18 AUG.: The minister of state for minority affairs and madrassa education, Mr Abdus Sattar, has asked the additional district magistrate (land reforms) to earmark a plot of land for the construction of a hostel and training centre for Muslim girls.

During a review meeting with the district officials for minority development , yesterday, Mr Sattar spoke of a plot of land, that presently belongs to a ‘private wakf’, located at Ward no 25 in English Bazaar municipality, and asked the district officials to prepare a project for the construction of a hostel and training centre for Muslim girlson the plot. Theland at Chandan Park is presently being used as a garbage dumping zone by the English Bazaar

municipality.

Recently following resistance from the locals, the district administration has allowed the civic body to use the land as a dumping ground for a month and have asked the civic body chief to find out another land for the purpose.

According to records of the district land and land reforms department, a total of 2.75 acre of land belongs to a private wakf out of 3.12 acre. In the mean time, a total of .037 acre land out of 3.12 acre has already been sold off in the name of three persons. The land records show that a person called Mr Abdur Rashid Khan was the caretaker of the land. The additional district magistrate, Mr KN Dew said: “We need to find out Mr Rashid Khan to discuss the project proposed by the minister”.

“If the owners of the wakf land do not agree to our proposal we have to initiate another course of action to declare it a vested-land. It is a time consuming method,” Mr Dew said.

Following the proposal from Mr Abdus Sattar, the district magistrate Mr Sridhar Ghosh said: “We have to formulate a plan so that we can utilise the land for the project proposed by the minister”.

The Malda Zilla Parishad had been looking for a plot of land for the construction of another hostel for Muslim girls in Malda town but due to the scarcity of lands, the board is yet to begin the proposed project. The additional executive officer of the Malda Zilla Parishad, Mr Kajal Banerjee said: “We shall discuss the matter proposed by the minister, in the next meeting which will be held soon for the construction of a hostel for Muslim girls”.

The helping hand

It may be a bad news for medical waste recycling racketeers who used to collect waste from Malda district hospital and other hospitals in English Bazaar town, but it is indeed a good news for English Bazaar municipality who does not have autoclave machines to dispose medical wastes scientifically, that are collected from huge number of nursing homes.

Following the guidelines of the pollution control board and under the bio-medical waste management programme, the government has selected some organisations that will collect medical wastes from hospitals and nursing homes for its proper disposal and scientific treatment.

The chief medical officer of health in Malda, Dr Srikanta Roy said that the government has assigned an organisation the task of collecting garbage and medical wastes from the Malda district hospital on the basis of a contract.

“A Matigara based organisation, near Siliguri, will collect medical wastes on regular basis and they will dispose them scientifically to control pollution," said Dr Srikanta Roy, the Malda CMOH.

“It was decided that the assigned organisation would start collecting garbage from 17 August, the hospital authorities now are developing the system in all wards," said Dr Roy. The system of bio-medical waste management has been started in other districts of north Bengal as well. “We have started to follow the method since last month. If the nursing homes do not follow the guidelines of medical waste management they would not be allowed to run under the clinical establishment Act”, said Dr RR Banik, the Cooch Behar CMOH.