SHILLONG, Sep 6: The National People’s Party on Tuesday said people opposed to resolving the interstate boundary row can vote for the opposition and those who want a solution can vote for the NPP.
Stating that 50 years is too long a time for the border residents to suffer, NPP state president and Rajya Sabha member WR Kharlukhi said this was the reason why the state government decided to settle the issue once and for all.
“Whoever does not want to solve the border issue can vote for the opposition and whoever wants to solve it can vote for us. We don’t want the affected people to suffer forever,” he said, referring to the incessant attacks by the Trinamool Congress on the boundary dispute-solving process.
Kharlukhi said the opposition opposes just for the sake of it and never acknowledges anything good the government does.
“Our problem here is we only see things politically. I believe there are times we should not think only about our own interest but the interest of the people,” he said.
Recalling the 2011 Langpih incident where four lives were lost, the NPP state president said: “What did our government then do to the Assam police who killed them? They should have been arrested.”
He said those who are opposing the boundary talks today were in the government in 2011 but let the Langpih incident happen. “We decided to end 50 years of suffering for the border residents,” he added.
Kharlukhi said a few leaders opposing the boundary talks had been asking the state government what it was doing to resolve the border dispute whenever any incident occurred. “This is what we are doing. We want to solve the problem and now they are opposing it,” he said.
