Assam-Meghalaya sign pact to resolve 50-year-old border dispute; Amit Shah says 70% row resolved

In a historic move, the chief ministers of Assam and Meghalaya today signed a pact to resolve their long-standing border dispute for six places, thus resolving a large part of the contention between the two northeastern states. The pact to resolve the 50-year-old pending boundary dispute was signed by Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and Meghalaya CM Conrad Sangma in the presence of Union Home minister Amit Shah.

Shah said that with the signing of the agreement, 70 per cent of the border dispute between the two states has been resolved. He termed the day as historic for the Northeast.

Meghalaya CM Sangma said that while the talks have been going on for many years, Home Minister Shah and PM Narendra Modi pushed to expedite the resolution in the last few years. “There has been a lot of push from the prime minister and the home minister that they would like to see that these differences resolved saying that if India and Bangladesh can resolve the border issues then why can’t two Indian states,” said Sangma.

He said that the PM and the HM have been continuously putting pressure on both the states to resolve the dispute. “We’re very thankful to Home Minister Amit Shah and Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma because they went the extra mile,” said the Meghalaya CM.

Assam CM Sarma said that both the states had 12 areas of dispute and it has been resolved in 6 areas.

What is the Assam-Meghalaya Border Dispute?

Assam shares its boundary with Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and West Bengal covering a length of over 2743 km. In August last year, the forces of Assam and Mizoram were involved in violent firing following which the Home Ministry had to intervene. The violent clash where six policemen were killed was just a peek into how grave the situation could turn in case of an inter-state border dispute.

The pact between Assam and Meghalaya eliminates to a large extent the possibility of the occurrence of a similar situation. The pact will resolve the protracted dispute in six of the 12 places along the 884.9 km border between the two states. There are 36 villages in the six places, covering an area of 36.79 sq km, with regard to which the agreement has been reached.

The two states had formed three committees each in August last year to go into the vexed boundary question. According to the joint final set of recommendations made by the committees, out of 36.79 sq km of the disputed area taken up for settlement in the first phase, Assam will get full control of 18.51 sq km and Meghalaya 18.28 sq km.

The boundary dispute between Assam and Meghalaya has lingered on for 50 years. Meghalaya was carved out of Assam as a separate state in 1972 but the new state had challenged the Assam Reorganisation Act, 1971, leading to the dispute on 12 locations in the border areas.