Border row: All-party meet today
Source: Hueiyen News Service
Imphal, October 09 2013 :
Bowing down to the growing public and political pressures for resolving the issue related to reported loss of a large portion of Manipur's land to Myanmar on account of the ongoing border fencing being carried out along the yet to be demarcated Indo-Myanmar International border at Moreh, Chief Minister O Ibobi Singh has finally mustered up the courage to convene an all-party meeting to discuss the issue tomorrow.
All these while, the Chief Minister has been no denial mode over the reported loss of land to Myanmar while harping on the commitment of his Government to protect the territorial integrity of Manipur.
According to an official source, Chief Minister O Ibobi Singh has extended formal invitation to the leaders of various National and Regional political parties in the State for attending the meeting which would begin from 4 pm tomorrow.
The invitations were dispatched through Manipur Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC).
Representatives of Naga People's Front (NPF), Manipur People's Party (MPP), Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Communist Party of India (CPI), Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Communist Party of India (Marxist), Manipur State Congress Party (MSCP), Manipur Pradesh Trinamool Congress (MPTC), Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), etc, which have been very vocal on the issue, would be among other political parties that would be attending the all-party meeting tomorrow, the source disclosed.
It may be noted here that since the issue over the reported loss of Manipur's land to Myanmar came to light, some political parties in the State have been demanding the Congress-led Government to convene an all-party meeting to discuss and find out ways and means of resolving the border dispute so that no land is ceded to Myanmar as a result of the border fencing.
Among the political parties, State unit CPI, which sent a party team to inspect the disputed border areas ahead of others, has been proposing calling of an all-party meeting to discuss the issue and for exerting pressures on the Central Government to resolve the border issue collectively.
MPP and BJP too have been making similar demand for discussing the border issue at an all party meeting.
The two parties have also made it clear that no land of Manipur should be allowed to be ceded to Myanmar in the ongoing border fencing.
On the other hand, various social organisations, more particularly, Committee on Protection of Land in Border Fencing (CPLBF), Manipur, have been demanding immediate halt on the border fencing construction work until a joint survey is conducted by the authorities of Govt of India and Myanmar to resolve the border row.
Protesting against the alleged lack of concern on the part of the Government of Manipur and India over the border dispute, CPLBF had even called a 12-hour State-wide bandh on October 7, which evoked massive support.
The source further disclosed that even though discussion on border issue would be the main agenda of the all-party meeting tomorrow, it would also likely to deliberate on exclusion of Manipur from the list of Special Category States as per the latest report of Dr Raghuram Rajan Committee on "Evolving a Composite Development Index of States', which was submitted to the Union Government on September 26 last.
As the loss of special Category State status would mean deprivation of 90 percent Central grant that Manipur used to get from the Centre for taking up developmental works in the State, the all-party meeting is likely to take a definite resolution and request the Government of India to include Manipur in the list of special category States once again, the source added.
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