CENTRE TO ADDRESS THE CORE ISSUES IN THE NORTH-EAST REGION FOR
ALL ROUND DEVELOPMENT
The Deputy Prime Minister, Shri L.K. Advani today
assured the Consultative Committee attached to the Home Ministry
that the Centre will address the core issues in North-Eastern
States with all sincerity. Addressing the Meeting Shri Advani
said Security and Development are inter-related. He allayed fears
expressed by some Members that the Government’s peace initiative
are tactical. Reiterating the Centre’s commitment for the all
out development of the North-Eastern Region he said it is because
of this commitment that the Government created a separate Ministry
(the Department for North-East Development) under a Cabinet Minister
to look into the problems of this vast region.
Participating in the discussion, particularly Members
from the North-East Shri Joyanta Rongpi, Shri Holkhomang Haokip,
Shri Rajkumar Wangcha said that immediate steps should be taken
to remove the feeling of alienation among the local tribals. They
said efforts should be made for a political solution of the problems
of the North-Eastern States, which are peculiar in nature. They
said the insurgency in the region is not cross-border but inborn.
Therefore, the problem can be solved only by addressing the core
issues in these States. Some of the Members also strongly criticized
the Government’s initiative for disinvestments in these States.
They said there is high unemployment and people are economically
not well off. The Government should itself take up the development
programmes which can benefit the local people.
Earlier, a presentation was made on the steps taken
to curb the militancy in North-East and the Centre’s effort to
accelerate development. The steps taken to curb militancy included
Peace Talks/suspension of operations with the NSCN(I/M), NSCN(K),
BLT and UPDS declaration of major groups like the ULFA, NDFB,
PLA, UNLF, HNLC as unlawful associations; declaration of Assam,
Manipur, Nagaland (whole) and parts of Arunachal and Tripura as
disturbed areas. Other measures included establishing of a Unified
Command System in Assam and Deployment of CPMFs as per requirement.
Over 632 crore rupees had been released by the Centre
during 1997-2002 as Security Related Reimbursement to these States
and an amount of 217 crores were released for modernization of
police forces during this period. Major initiatives were taken
to create infrastructure under the Prime Minister’s package and
non-lapsable Pool of Resources. The presentation demonstrated
that after the peace initiative and cease-fire agreements the
incidents of insurgency and killings have sharply come-down during
the last four-five years. The presentation identified the main
demands of tribal groups as including economic development, deportation
of Bangladeshi migrants and restoration of alienated land.
At the outset, when the Consultative Committee meeting
began this morning with Members cutting across party lines expressing
their eagerness to know the details of the terrorist attack on
the Amarnath yatris’ Camp near Pahalgam and wanted to know whether
there was any security lapse. The Special Secretary in the Home
Ministry, Shri A.K. Bhandari who had visited the spot of the killing
briefed the Members on what exactly happened. Nine persons were
killed and 27 injured in the incident.
The Deputy Prime Minister said that with the kind
of Fidayeen attacks now being carried out by the terrorist groups,
incidents of this kind are taking place even with best of security
arrangements in place. Taking into consideration the new developments
the Government is devising strategies to tackle the situation,
he said.
Strongly condemning the incident Shri Somnath Chatterjee,
Shri G.M. Banatwalla, Gen. Shankar Roy Chowdhury and Shri Ali
Mohd. Naik said that the militant attack was mainly aimed to disrupt
the peace process and coming elections in Jammu & Kashmir.
Government should take extra precaution to avoid such incidents
in future.
Those who attended the Meeting today are S/Shri Holkhomang
Haokip; G.M. Banatwalla, Somnath Chatterjee, G. Ganga Reddy, Ali
Mohd. Naik; Rajkumar Wangcha, Saiduzzaman; Joyanta Rongpi; Avtar
Singh Badhana; Anandicharan Sahu; and Smt. Ranee Narah all from
the Lok Sabha and S/Shr Dina Nath Mishra; , S. Viduthalai Virumbi;
Gen. S. Roy chowdhury (Retd.); Balbir K. Punj; and Dr. V. Maitreyan
all from the Rajya Sabha. The Ministers of State Shri Ch. Vidyasagar
Rao and Shri I.D. Swami also attended the Meeting.
