Ampareen Lyngdoh, a suspended Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader, slammed the All India Trinamool Congress for encouraging unhappy villages along the Assam-Meghalaya border.
She believes that there has already been enough confusion on the border, and that political parties should refrain from inciting discontent beyond the terms of the two-state agreement.
Mukul M Sangma, the former Chief Minister and Senior AITC leader, had lately visited a few border villages and attempted to highlight the unwillingness of some dissatisfied locals to join Assam.
“It is quite unfortunate because every time an election approaches, everyone in Meghalaya becomes very patriotic,” she said. “I believe that all political parties should be pleased with the way the first phase of the border talks with Assam ended,” Lyngdoh stated.
She stated that the second phase of the debate is still ongoing, and that stakeholders should petition the Centre, the arbitrator in the interstate border dispute, rather than causing havoc in the run-up to the elections.
“The Meghalaya chief minister is accurate in stating that the case has been referred to Delhi. The CMs of the two states cannot back out of the agreement, thus these groups should have either attended the hearings prior to the memorandum of understanding or petitioned the Centre,” Lyngdoh said.
She claimed that if the opposition was really concerned about the border issue, its leaders should have been present when the regional committees went to the ground, rather than parading on the border to look to be Meghalaya’s rescue.
Any party or organization dissatisfied with the border deal on six of the 12 points of contention should knock on the Centre’s door and let it decide, according to Lyngdoh.
The long-standing border issue between Assam and Meghalaya was recently resolved in the first phase, resolving six disputed regions. Since then, the opposition has blasted the current government for resolving the order issue without the agreement of the community’s indigenous people, since many portions of Meghalaya have been unexpectedly relocated to Assam.
Meanwhile, VGK Kynta, a senior counsel and constitutional expert, refused to accept that the MoU signed by the governments of Assam and Meghalaya on the interstate border dispute cannot be reviewed or altered, and sought a referendum in the affected districts on Sunday.
