SHILLONG: The Coordination Committee on International Border (CCIB) has decided to boycott the survey for erection of fencing along the Indo-Bangla border scheduled to be held on Monday in West Jaintia Hills.
Informing this here, the FKJGP leader and CCIB member Joe Marwein said that the decision to this effect was taken during an emergency meeting held on Friday.
“We are not happy with the Government’s decision to go ahead with the survey,” Marwein said.
According to Marwein, the survey has been scheduled on three locations on the same day which indicated that the Government wanted to confuse the land owners and create a divide among the CCIB members.
The district administration of West Jaintia Hills in a letter to the CCIB has asked its members to be present during the survey.
The CCIB has been demanding erection of fencing along the Zero Line in the state’s border with Bangladesh.
The CCIB also opposed the land boundary agreement in Bangladesh saying Meghalaya would lose a huge amount of land if the land swap agreement is implemented.
The two nations signed a protocol and exchanged instruments of ratification to make operational the Land Boundary Agreement (LBA) in Dhaka in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bangladeshi counterpart, Sheikh Hasina in June last year.
According to the first report of the Standing Committee on External Affairs, areas in adverse possession to be acquired by Meghalaya amounted to 240.578 acres.
These include Pyrdiwah (193.516 acres), Lyngkhat I (4.793 acres), Lyngkhat II (0.758 acres), Lyngkhat III (6.94 acres), Dawki/Tamabil (1.557 acres), Naljuri I (6.156 acres) and Naljuri II (26.858 acres).
However, under the deal, Meghalaya will have to transfer 41.702 acres of land in the Lobacherra-Nuncherra sector to Bangladesh.
