GUWAHATI, Sept 6 : The Indigenous Progressive Regional Alliance (TIPRA) chairman Pradyot Manikya Debbarma appealed to all regional parties in the Northeast to unite and put forth their agendas from a common platform so that they are heard at the Centre.
Speaking at a programme of Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP) here on Tuesday as chief guest, Debbarma, who quit the Congress to lead the regional party in Tripura, urged the regional parties to “be less political and be more of a movement” to be able to thwart any attempt to suppress indigenous people, their language and culture.
Pledging to reach out to every regional party in the Northeast, he said that efforts were being made by TIPRA to unite the regional forces.
“TIPRA is already in talks with IPFT, which is a regional party and an ally of BJP in Tripura and we have had constructive deliberations so far. I have always said that if we speak in one voice, everybody hears us. We will definitely talk with regional parties of other states such as the People’s Party of Arunachal, National People’s Party and United Democratic Party,” Debbarma said.
“Our fight is for survival and existence. Before delimitation takes place in the year 2026, regional parties have to unite or else there will be nothing left for our people and the glorious civilisation of the indigenous people of Tripura will be wiped out…Apart from language and culture there is threat to economic growth, employment …so time has come to fight for ‘Greater Tipraland’,” he said.
Ruling out any alliance with national parties, he further said that “if needed we will fight the polls in our own might. Polls will come and go but we are fighting for a movement. If at all a party wants to align with us, they have to give us an assurance of fulfilling our demands in writing.”
Stating that TIPRA’s fight has been for a constitutional settlement, he said that the central government must undo the injustice done to the indigenous people.
“They created a problem because of mismanagement and ignorance or lack of care for indigenous people…so they have to solve the problem. I am happy that the Assam Jatiya Parishad has extended support to TIPRA” he said.
Reflecting on TIPRA’s council poll triumph, Debbarma said a “small regional party with 80 percent of members below the age of 35 won the polls, when people had prior to the polls cast doubts as to how we would contest against BJP, which is the ruling party at the state and Centre,
“So we have to start believing in ourselves…let us put up one final fight so that we can’t be blamed for not trying,” he said.
The TIPRA chairman further revealed plans of erecting a statue of Ahom general Lachit Barphukan in a Northeast heritage park in Tripura.
“We also have to start respecting each other’s history…as our books (in mainstream) do not have any or have limited mention of Northeast history. So this park will have statues of our region’s heroes,” he said.