GUWAHATI, June 3: Assam Chief Minister and NEDA convener, Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday informed that Union Home Minister Amit Shah, in all likelihood, might visit Shillong next month and meet the chief ministers of the Northeastern states to discuss all pending issues, including the vexed border problem.
Speaking to the media in New Delhi, Sarma said that he had met Shah a couple of times and was informed that the Union Home Minister might pay a two or three-day visit to Shillong in July to discuss the border issues with the chief ministers of the Northeastern states besides also deliberating on other pending issues, including drug trafficking.
The chief minister also informed that he has been in touch with neighbouring states of Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya in regard to border issues. “We are constantly discussing border issues with the three states,” he said.
Asked about Assam’s border “tension” with Nagaland, Sarma said the matter was under the ambit of the Supreme Court, and that any judgment by the apex court on border demarcation of the two states would be final.
“The Nagaland chief minister had recently written a letter to me about the current incidents along the border. Besides, Assam Border Area Development Minister Atul Bora has been in touch with him. The two states should not encroach on each other’s land and I believe that there is no reason for the Northeastern states to get into a conflict with each other. Rather we should maintain the spirit (of camaraderie) among the ‘seven sisters’,” Sarma said.
