Kalahandi deserves HC bench, activist writes to Union Law Minister

Bhubaneswar, Oct 2 :

Loknath Nayak, a concerned citizen and activist has written to the Union Law minister to apprise him of the great need to set up a high court Bench in Bhawanipatna, the headquarters of Kalahandi district.

Following is the text of his letter :

Dear Honorable Law Minister, Mr. Sibal,

Sir,In response to the letter written by honble’ Chief Ministerof Odisha regarding establishment of  two high court benches in South and Western Odisha respectively, I draw your kind attentionto the fact that the honorable CM has justified the same citing Nuapada is 575 km and Malkangiri is 647 km from the principal seat of the high court in Odisha, based in Cuttack, since independence.

If high court bench in Cuttack is unable to serve people in Berhampur region, then Odisha at least needs 15 high court benches across the state. For your information, the communication between Berhampur and Cuttack is outstanding compared to between Malkangiri and Berhampur. There is also excellent communication between Cuttack and Sambalpur as compared to Nuapada and Sambalpur.

The CM’s letter might be only a game of political appeasement. Technically, the Hon’ble CM perhaps wants to ignore the genuine demand of remote, backward and deprived locations in the KBK region.The present proposal is largely meant to suit CM’s home district and his political ambition.

A high court bench for deprived KBK region is a genuine demand and can serve the backward and far off locations comprising Nuapada, Malkangiri, Nabarangpur, Koraput, Kalahandi,Raigada,Phulbani,Boudhand Gajapati districts. Even if the CM felt two HC benches are required, he should rather have emphasised on the need to establish one of them in KBK region.

FIVE REASONS

1- Firstly the deprived KBK region fulfils 98% of criteria  of the Jaswant commission’s recommendations as reflected in part-1 and part-2.

2- Secondly Kalahandi is the central district in KBK, which is convenient for people in Malkangiri, Nabarangpur, Nuapada,Raygada,Bolangir,Boudh,Sonepur,Gajapati,Kandhamal etc.

3-Thirdly, location wise Bhawanipatna can also serve the interest of majority of Southern Odisha districts like Gajapati, Kandhamal and Boudh and Raygada.

4- Fourthly, for the whole western Odisha, from Motu in Malkangiri district to Balijod in Sundergarh district, Kesinga-Madanpur Rampur region of Kalahandi district would be an ideal and central location to meet the requirement of Koraput, Malkangiri, Nabarangpur,Raigada,Bolangir,Kandhamal and Gajapati etc in South Odisha to Jharsuguda, Sundergarh, Deogarh etc in Western Odisha.

5- Fifthly, Odisha do not have any additional high court bench besides the  principal seat of the high court.

So recommendation of two high court benches by Odisha’s CM seems to dilute the requirement of the KBK deprived since independence.

Kalahandi is well connected by the state highway, National Highway,Railway, Air strip (Utkela permanent air strip), Infrastructure like medical,education,tourism with unique social back grounds.

Kalahandi Maharaja identified His Palace for the high Court Permanent Bench at the request of entire public of the region by executing an affidavit and by the way, Kalahandi is the only district free from left wing terrorism in the entire region.

So in my view no politics should be played over this matter and a high court bench should be established in Kalahandi for KBK region based on  Jaswant Singh commission’s recommendations.Kalahandi is the only place that connects both west and south Odisha in the truest sense.

I hope you will seriously take the matter into account for the betterment of KBK people and this would be in consonance with the policy of  the Union Govt which aims at upliftment of the poor and the deprived people of the entire KBK region.

Thank you and best regards