Solan: 70th Independence Day was celebrated with enthusiasm and gaiety throughout Himachal Pradesh today. Functions were organised at State, District and Sub-Divisional levels to mark the occasion. Unfurling National Flag, march-past by contingents of Police, Home Guards, NCC, ITBP and cultural programmes were main attractions of the celebrations. People in large number in their traditional attire had started to assemble the venue of functions early morning to witness the celebration.
Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, while presiding over the State Level Independence day celebration function at Solan, announced 6 percent Dearness Allowance to the serving employees and pensioners of the State government from 1st January 2016, to be included in salary of October and payable in November. The employees and pensioners have already been provided interim relief of 5 percent from August 2016.
Chief Minister said that since the day we came to power, the goal of my Government had been to provide best of Education, Health services and Road connectivity to the people of Himachal Pradesh, besides ensuring their welfare by all means and the employees played a pivotal role in providing required fillip to the development.
“Education is the backbone of developed society and to achieve the objective, the primary focus of my Government has been to empower every child by providing basic and quality education”, said the Chief Minister. To achieve the objective as many as 1010 schools in the State were either upgraded and the new ones opened. ‘Mukhya Mantri Adarsh Vidyalya Yojna’, has been launched to provide State of the Art infrastructural and teaching facilities in two Senior Secondary Schools in each constituency, he said.
The CM claimed of providing as many as 41,500 jobs in Government sector besides regularising thousands of daily wagers in his present tenure.
He said that Independence was a hard won battle and the contribution of people of Himachal Pradesh in the struggle for Independence can’t be forgotten. He extended felicitations to the people of the State and also paid homage and gratitude to Dr. Yashwant Singh Parmar, the founder and first Chief Minister of Himachal, who not only spearheaded the struggle for a separate entity to the State, but also laid a sound foundation for its development.
The Chief Minister also honoured the freedom fighters on the occasion.
