Shillong, Sept 14: Meghalaya chief minister Conrad K Sangma on Wednesday ruled out revisiting the MoU signed with Assam to resolve boundary dispute between the two States as “98 per cent people are happy with it”.
Conrad told the Assembly 18 visits were made and 50 meetings were held in the grassroot level by the regional committees before the MoU was signed.
Apart from the regional committee meetings, the chief ministers of the two States had met seven times to resolve the boundary dispute.
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“Almost 98 per cent of the people are not complaining today. They are satisfied. Revisiting the MoU will not happen,” he said in his reply during question hour.
Certain villages located deep inside Assam territory and wanting to be with Meghalaya cannot be accepted as the administration is closer for them in that State, he said.
The historic border deal to resolve the decades-old border dispute in six of the 12 contentious areas had been signed on March 30 in Delhi by Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and Conrad in the presence of Union Home minister Amit Shah.
The House witnessed heated debates as Khun Hynniewtrep National Awakening Movement (KHNAM) MLA Adelbert Nongrum was seen accusing the government of not taking into confidence all stakeholders.
Speaker Metbah Lyngdoh had to intervene to calm the situation.
Demanding the review, Nongrum said, “If the Constitution of India can be amended from time to time, why cannot an MoU be revisited?”
To this Conrad asked Nongrum to pinpoint a specific area where the people are not satisfied but the KHNAM lawmaker did not do so.
The chief minister said “I met traditional heads, political parties and NGOs. We have engaged even at my level,” he said.
He told the House that certain villages located deep inside Assam territory and wanting to be in Meghalaya cannot be accepted as the administration is closer for them in Assam.
The MoU aims to ease tensions along 70 per cent of the frontier. The disputed area involves around 36.79 sq km straddling 36 villages.
The two chief ministers had submitted to Shah in January the draft recommendations of committees they had set up. (PTI)
