Shillong Mar 31 PTI Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Thursday said that in a big relief for the state NTPC has agreed to allocate 70 per cent of its share of power to Tamil NaduThe Congress government had in 2007 signed an agreement with NTPC entailing a fixed annual payment of around Rs 130 crore to the central PSU The pact was for 25 years and the state would have to pay a total of Rs 3300 crore approximatelyThe current National Peoples Party-led Meghalaya Democratic Alliance MDA government has been trying to get out of that agreementWe are very fortunate that after a lot of hard work and even some court cases now NTPC has agreed to a proposal and it is working towards reallocating the power to different states Sangma told reportersOf the states share of 86 MW NTPC has allotted 56 MW to Tamil Nadu which means that Meghalaya does not have to pay for almost 70 per cent of unused power he saidThe chief minister said the state government is hopeful that the rest of the 25-30 MW will also be given to other states very soonWith that we will be completely free from this agreement he saidOn April 16 last year the MDA government had decided to terminate the Power Purchase Agreement PPA signed by the then Congress-led state government with NTPC in 2007It was of the opinion that the continuation of the PPA has become a burden on the state exchequer as the state was not drawing on its allocation of power from the company as the cost was higher than the prevailing market price PTI JOP NN NN

Shillong Oct 21 PTI A new micro snail species was found from deep inside a limestone cave at Mawsmai village in Meghalayas East Khasi Hills district scientists who discovered it said on ThursdayThe snails having scientific name Georissa mawsmaiensis are so small in size that an adult measures less than 2 millimetres in lengthThe discovery was made by Nipu Kumar Das and NA Aravind scientists of the Bengaluru-based Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment ATREEATREE also tweeted about thisWe have named this new species as Georissa mawsmaiensis after this limestone cave Mawsmai We collected the snails on the moist limestone rocks 4-5 m inside the cave entrance However at present we dont know whether our species is a true cave species or not Das and Aravind told PTI in email interactionsA member of the same group genus Georissa saritta was discovered 170 years ago in the same areaThe two scientists said their species was a little bit different from Georissa sarrita which was documented in 1851 by WH Benson a civil servant in British India and an amateur malacologist who studies shell-less invertebratesThe new species is different in shell size compared to the earlier one Besides it has four very prominent spiral striations on body whorls of the shell compared to seven in Georissa sarritaUntil now five snail species have been found from the caves of Meghalaya and there could be more they saidHowever Meghalaya is famous for its caves and the two scientists are concerned that tourist footfalls could affect the ecology of the areaThe cave has a very unique environment that can harbour unique faunal diversity There are several studies on cave biodiversity in Southeast Asian countries and other parts of the world which reported various animals including snails but very few studies are there from Indian caves the two saidThese caves are very sensitive to change in environmental conditions resulting from anthropogenic activities such as mining and cave tourism causing negative impacts on animals living inside themMawsmai cave is one of the major tourist attractions of Sohra erstwhile Cherrapunji Lately artificial lights and cemented floor and steps have been added inside to make it more tourist-friendly PTI JOP NN NN

Shillong Aug 31 PTI The Meghalaya government on Tuesday inked a memorandum of understanding MoU with the Meghalaya Rural Bank aiming at easing banking services in rural areas an official saidAn MoU was signed between the finance department represented by Finance Commissioner and Secretary Dr D Vijay Kumar and Chairman of Meghalaya Rural Bank Tshering DekiThis will help the state achieve its objective of financial inclusion and also in transferring the financial benefits of the state as well as the central government directly into the bank accounts of the eligible beneficiaries in unbanked areas Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma said on the occasionThe MoU will address the fundamental problem of access to finance in rural or remote areas of the state he saidThe state government will support the Meghalaya Rural Bank in deploying 600 business correspondents across the state a bank official saidThe business correspondents will be given micro ATMs to pay cash at the doorsteps of customers and will assist people in other banking works PTI JOP NN NN