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Govt to set up new ministry for the North-East

George Iype in New Delhi

The Atal Bihari Vajpayee government is chalking out a special package for the North-Eastern states including the creation of a Union ministry for North-East Affairs.

Sources said Prime Minister Vajpayee and Home Minister L K Advani have finalised a plan to bring the seven NE states into the national mainstream.

While the prime minister is on the look-out for a suitable candidate to head the new ministry, the BJP government's special economic package -- Rs 75 billion -- for the North-Eastern states will be discussed with its chief ministers in New Delhi on Friday.

The chief ministers, who are members of the North East Council, will meet Vajpayee, Advani and Jaswant Singh, deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, and present estimates of development funds they need in their respective states. The meeting will also admit Sikkim as the eighth member of the NEC.

Vajpayee is keen to induct an expert on the North-East as the new Union minister for the region. Dr Jayant Madhab, chairman of the North-East Finance Development Corporation, is the front-runner for the post.

Dr Madhab is a former director of the Asian Development Bank and a member of the Shukla Commission on the North-East. He recently led a high-level panel on industrial development to Assam.

A home ministry official said the new ministry will co-ordinate and monitor all central projects in Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura.

"A special ministry for the region will help the states escape the utter neglect of the North-East since Independence by successive central governments," the official told Rediff On The NeT.

He said the ministry's top priorities will be to speed up infrastructure projects like new roads, rail lines, airports, bridges, oil refineries and gas stations in the seven states.

Presently, though all central ministries earmark nearly 10 per cent of their annual budgetary allocation for the North-Eastern states, a large chunk of these funds are either misused or returned un-utilised.

Years ago, the Shukla Commission that investigated the region's problems recommended the setting up of a nodal agency to look after projects and the development initiative like better drinking water facilities, improved housing, more schools and hospitals in the seven states.

The new ministry will not only oversee development in the region, but also try and resolve the festering ethnic conflicts in these states. A major priority would be tackling the insurgency in states like Nagaland.

While Manipur and Nagaland have been bedevilled by ethnic clashes between the Christian tribals -- Kukis and Nagas -- the insurgency in Assam has virtually halted agricultural and industrial reforms in the state for many years.

Sources said the Vajpayee government is also planning to repeal the entry laws in the North-Eastern states. These laws -- the restricted areas permit, the prohibited areas permit and the inner line permit -- now restrict Indians and foreigners from carrying out any activity without government permission.

Under these laws, no person is allowed "to create tribal disturbances and law and order problems in the pre-dominantly sensitive tribal areas of the states." While the PAP and RAP are applicable in Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh, the ILP is imposed only in Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh.

EARLIER REPORT:
North Eastern Council seeks more powers from Centre

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