Declare Orissa a special category state: Naveen tells PM

Chief Minister Naveen Patanik has reiterated his demand for declaring Orissa a special category state.

Patnaik has yet again sought Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's intervention on the matter.

“It is learnt that the Government of India has been considering to include some other states like Bihar in the list of special category states. Orissa having a very high concentration of scheduled tribes and scheduled caste communities, adverse human development indicators and high incidence of poverty needs to be declared as a special category state,” Patnaik said is his letter to the Prime Minister.