Guwahati, Sep 14: Assam parliamentary affairs minister Pijush Hazarika on Tuesday slammed previous governments in the state for not taking pragmatic initiatives to address the border issues with neighbouring states over the past five decades unlike the current dispensation.
Speaking at the autumn session of the Assam Legislative Assembly, Hazarika countered the Opposition, saying that the “indifference of the previous governments in Assam to the border resolution issues with neighbouring states had earned Assam a bad name elsewhere in the country. Hence, now the BJP-led government, realising the need to resolve the border issues in the right earnest, has taken initiatives in this regard.”
“But while doing so, we have given emphasis on the ‘give and take policy’ based on people’s mandate. It is also a fact that neither state can forcefully keep people in their area if they do not wish to remain there,” the minister said.
The six ‘less complicated’ disputed areas in Assam and Meghalaya that were taken up for final settlement in March this year include Tarabari (4.69 sq km), Gizang (13.53 sq km), Hahim (3.51 sq km), Boklapara (1.57 sq km), 2.29 sq km area of Khanapara-Pilangkata and Ratacherra with 11.20 sq km.
The two states had on August 21 initiated the second phase of chief minister-level discussions to resolve border issues in the remaining six disputed sites, deciding to constitute regional committees for making site visits and holding stakeholder/public consultations, an exercise similar to the one adopted in case of the ‘less-complicated’ inter-state boundary sites.
Simultaneously, the decades-long border resolution process between Assam and Arunachal Pradesh has also been expedited with regional committees from the two states already visiting several villages along the inter-state boundary and interacting with residents to know their aspirations.
The regional committees of Assam and Arunachal Pradesh are scheduled to submit the reports of the site visits to the respective governments by September 15, 2022.
