Agartala:Tripura Congress demanded elevation of status of Tripura Tribal Areas Auto-nomous District Council (TTAADC) to autonomous council with little more power for the development of the tribals in the state.
Tripura Pradesh Cong-ress Committee’s tribal wing Chief Bimal Chakma said here on Friday the party never supported or endorsed the idea of separate state for tribal with-in Tripura raised by tribal based Indigenous Nationa-list Party of Tripura (INPT).
The party had submitted a memorandum to Union Home Minister of State Kiran Rijiju demanding change of nomenclature of Tripura tribal area district council to tribal council with more administrative auto-nomy for empowerment of the tribals but opposed the demand of separate state, Mr Chakma said.
He however, pointed out that a 16-member delegation of Congress had met to Mr Rijiju last week in Delhi and stated that there are autonomous councils for tribals in all other northeas-tern states but in Tripura it is autonomous district council (ADC) though tribals have not been confined only in one district.
‘Tribals are scattered all over the state and geogra-phical demarcation of ADC is also spread across the state, hence ADC should change it’s nomenclature as autonomous council taking the precedence of other states,’ Mr Chakma stated.
He also maintained left front government in Tripura has not been interested to empower ADC, as they wanted to control the tribals from Agartala as their will and wish to achieve political mileage.
‘It is observed that ADC administration is always dependent on the state for financial issues and Tripura tribal ADC is functioning like a rural or urban local body of the state government and do not have any power to finalise any plan of action at their own’ Mr Chakma said.
‘The previous govern-ment at the centre had sought the view of the state government on propo-sed empowerment bill but Manik Sarkar kept it in abeyance for more than six months without action and finally when it was sent, the government virtually oppo-sed the bill,’ he further alleged. (UNI)
