Politics / Northeast

GUWAHATI, August 22: The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) today announced its first list of candidates, whose names were cleared by the party's core committee yesterday, for the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections in the Northeast States. The party will contest 10 seats of its own out of the 14 Lok Sabha seats in the state. The NCP general secretary and former Lok Sabha Speaker, Purno A Sangma told a press conference that the party had, so far, finalised the names of four candidates for Assam. The names of candidates for the remaining six seats will be declared on August 30 next. The party will...

KARIMGANJ, August 19: The Union government has fixed the year 2007 as the deadline to complete construction of fencing and border roads along the entire stretch of the Indo-Bangla border from Mizoram to West Bengal, GK Pillai, joint secretary (Northeast) in the Union home ministry said today. Pillai, who is here in connection with the visit of a joint delegation of the Union government, the state government and the All Assam Students Union (AASU) to the border areas of Karimganj district, said the people of the state have to take up the responsibility of checking illegal infiltration into the...

NEW DELHI, August 16: The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has proposed to establish a National Register of Citizens besides promising to introduce multi-purpose identity cards for all citizens. Apart from making a passing reference to prepare the register, the NDA's agenda released here today by Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee makes no mention about the foreigners issue or the insurgency problem of the Northeast. BJP's stand on the controversial Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunals) Act find no mention either. All that the 10-page manifesto says about its proposed programme...

NEW DELHI, August 12: Despite the ``Sangma factor'', the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) has failed to make inroads into northeastern states which have among them 24 Lok Sabha seats. Political observers believe that former Lok Sabha speaker P.A. Sangma would win from Tura in Meghalaya again. However, they feel the NCP would not be able to win Shillong, the second Lok Sabha seat in Meghalaya as the United Minority Front (UMF) is well entrenched there. ``Sangma would himself win again from Tura but his party has little chance of winning from Shillong,'' a senior leader close to Sangma said...

NEW DELHI, August 11: The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) has decided to focus on the Northeast in the coming Lok Sabha elections by notching up electoral alliances with regional parties and announcing a special development package for the area in its election manifesto. The party has decided to field candidates in 18 out of the 25 Lok Sabha seats in the Northeast. It has also reached an electoral understanding with United Minority Front (UMF) in Assam, United Democratic Party (UDP) in Meghalaya and the TUJS in Tripura to put up joint candidates in several constituencies. The NCP feels that...

AIZAWL, August 8: The Myanmar Army accidentally entered 300 metres inside Indian territory last week while chasing a group of rebels, two of whom were later killed, authoritative intelligence sources here claimed. Eight days back in Mizoram's Chhimtuipui district at the India-Myanmar-Bangladesh trijunction, a Myanmar Army patrol, while chasing a group of Arakan Muslim rebels, entered about 300 metres inside the Indian territory. In the subsequent encounter, two of the rebels were killed, senior officials of a central security agency in the state said. The Arakanese are an ethnic group in...

IMPHAL, August 7: Hundreds of human rights activists from the entire northeastern region have come out unitedly to fight the draconian laws imposed in the region. The human rights defenders from West Bengal, Orissa, Bihar, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Tripura and Arunachal Pradesh have also agreed to observe November 27 as Anti-Armed Forces Special Powers Act Day until and unless the Act is repealed. This was announced by a team of human rights activists of Manipur who participated in the recently-concluded Amnesty International workshop at Bhubaneswar. The executive director of Human Rights...

AGARTALA, August 7-The seven Northeast states have jointly urged the underground militant outfits of the region not to hinder developmental works. A resolution to this effect was passed at the 46th meeting of the North Eastern Regional Electricity Board (NEREB) here yesterday. Power ministers from Assam, Manipur, Tripura, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and deputy chief minister of Mizoram, also holding the power portfolio, attended the meeting. The NEREB chairman and Tripura power minister Badal Chowdhury told newsmen here today that all the seven power ministers expressed concern over...

DELHI, August 1: The Manipur government has moved the Supreme Court detailing the differences between Bishnupriyas and Manipuris over the recognition of Bishnupriyas as Other Backward Classes (OBCs) by the states of Assam and Tripura. The Manipur government has challenged the decision of the Guwahati High Court to include Bishnupriya Manipuris in the State list of OBCs saying the court has given the direction without going into the question whether such a community existed at all. The petitioner said the decision of the states of Assam and Tripura allowing prefixing or suffixing of the word...

DHAKA, Aug 1 - Bangladesh will ask New Delhi to provide facility for transit of its goods through India to Nepal and Bhutan in lieu of the transhipment of Indian goods through its territory and seek duty-free access for 25 export products to Indian market, its commerce minister Tofail Ahmed said here today. Ahmed said Dhaka will seek duty-free access for the export products on a non-reciprocal basis when modalities for transhipment of Indian goods are discussed at the next meeting of the joint committee of experts. Ahmed said during his meeting with Indian commerce minister Ramakrishna Hegde...