Govt to set up 10 new rehabilitation & de-addiction centres in Meghalaya

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaOctober 12, 2023

The State government has decided to set up 10 new rehabilitation centres and deaddiction centres across the state.

“We are proposing to set up new centres – de addiction as well as rehabilitation centres – with the active support of the Ministry from Delhi. Roughly, around 10 new centres (are being proposed),” Social Welfare Minister Paul Lyngdoh told reporters on Thursday.

Whether the government is going to set up a women rehabilitation centre considering there are quite a substantial number of women drug users in the state, Lyngdoh said, “Very good idea, we should be able to do that.”

Meghalaya has over 2.5 lakh drug users as per statistics available with the department. Shillong along with other seven districts have been identified as ‘drug hotspots’ in the state.

Asked about the exorbitant fees charged by rehabilitation centres for treatment, Lyngdoh said that the government through his department is funding the rehabilitation centres.

The minister also announced that the government has decided to take a periodic appraisal on the performances of these centres adding that any corruption charges should not be repeated while referring to the alleged misappropriation of funds by Voluntary Health Association Of Meghalaya (VHAM) in 2017.

“It should not be repeated. Now, we have a good team in the department. We are also coordinating with the health and police department and things should improve,” he said.

Meanwhile, the minister informed that the government has notified the members of the monitoring committee for implementation of the Drugs Reduction, Elimination and Action Mission (DREAM).

“Also on the part of home (police) have already constituted the advisory board which will go into the various cases of violation of the PITNDPS Act, 1988, which we have just adopted. At the moment few names have been considered and have been forwarded by the home (police) to the advisory board in order to get their clearance for the detention of some individuals under this act,” he said.