On the occasion of completion of 100 year of staging of Rupkonwar Jyoti Prasad Agarwala’s first play ‘Sonit Konwari’ and on the occasion of 100 year completion of Mahatma Gandhi’s visit to Jyoti Bharati Museum ‘Poki’, Chief Minister Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma today visited Poki and paid his rich tributes to the portraits of Jyoti Prasad Agarwala.
Dr. Sarma during his visit also saw and appreciated all the relics like books and other documents, bed where Gandhiji slept during his visit to Poki and a mirror brought from Belgium.
Later, Chief Minister Dr. Sarma participated in an interaction with the senior citizens of Tezpur at Poki which was organised by Jyoti Bharati. During the interactive meeting, the Chief Minister said that Rupkonwar Jyoti Prasad Agarwala, Kalaguru Bishnu Prasad Rabha and Natasurya Phani Sharma established and fortified a strong foundation of Assamese culture. He said that State government is committed to preserve this rich cultural heritage of Assam. He also called upon every member of young generation to visit Poki. He said that with the Directorate of Museum, steps will be taken to preserve every item of Poki using latest technology. In this contest, he asked DC, Sonitpur to have discussion with all the leading citizens of Tezpur to draft a mechanism for scientific preservation of all the belongings of Poki. He said that funds will not be a constraint.
Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Ashok Singhal, MP Pallab Lochan Das, MLAs Prithvi Raj Rabha, Krishna Kamal Tanti and several leading citizens were present on the occasion. On the sidelines, Lakhya Bijay Kalita a child prodigy gifted two of his self-written books to Dr. Sarma.
Later, Chief Minister Dr. Sarma visited Chowk Bazar which was badly gutted in month of May last year. During his visit, Dr. Sarma also spent time with the shopkeepers and traders and interacted with them. He also inspected the infrastructure being built in the aftermath of the devastating fire.
It may be noted that following the devastating fire, State government extended its financial help for the traders to reconstruct their business houses. He also asked Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Ashok Singhal to take steps at the earliest to rehabilitate the shopkeepers.