Fencing work in disputed areas still on: Cong
Source: Chronicle News Service

Imphal, June 24 2022: Recalling how the Congress government stopped the border fencing work following public disenchantment, Manipur Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) vice-president Hareshwar Goswami said that the BJP government resumed the contentious border fencing work as soon as it came to power in 2017 .

Addressing a press meet at Congress Bhawan here on Friday, Hareshwar said that the Congress party strongly condemned the police action against the public protesting against the ongoing border fencing construction in which a member of UCM and a journalist were injured.

He informed that a team of MPCC visited Kwatha and inspected Border Pillar 81 on Thursday.

They found that construction of border fencing between BP 80 and 81 still continuing and almost completed.

Works for only about 300 metres (three subsidiary pillars) remained to be done.

As per 1860 report, BP 81 should be erected at a distance of 120 yards from the meeting point of Namchetlun and Namju but the current location of BP 81 is at a distance of around 350 metres from the meeting point, he said while demanding the government to form a panel with members from CSOs, media and experts to conduct spot enquiry.

He further said that Congress will join CSOs and the public in the movement to protect the state's boundary.

On the other hand, Hareshwar termed as indeed a good start on the part of the government to write a letter to the ministry of home affairs for putting on hold the border fencing work.

However, upon studying the content of the letter, Congress party does not find any satisfactory steps from the government to uphold the public demand.

Though there are several disputed areas along the Indo-Myanmar border, the letter mentioned only BP 81 and 82 as the disputed area while allowing the fencing work in other areas.

Maintaining that around 35 km out of the 395 km length of Indo-Myanmar border is disputed, Hareshwar questioned the ground on which the government is classifying disputed and undisputed areas.

As per reports, the disputed areas include Tuivai Molchang area (BP 64 - 68), Haolenphai area (BP 73 - 75), Tamu-Moreh area (BP 75 -79), Kwatha area (BP 80 - 83) and Choro Khunou area (BP 88 - 95) .

Unfortunately, the state government in its letter to MHA mentioned only BP 81 and 82 as the disputed area, he said, while terming the letter as an attempt to mislead the public so that they could continue the border fencing without any hiccup.

Though the boundary agreement signed in Yangon is the source to define the boundary between India and Myanmar, there was an incident of Myanmarese army removing border pillar from Tuivai Molchang area in 1972 citing a fresh boundary agreement, he continued.

The Congress vice president also referred to Regional Integration volume 13 issue of September 1932 edited by then Manipur University registrar Dr RK Ranjan which claimed that huge chunk of state land has been lost to Myanmar between BP 64 and 68 .

The article was published along with supporting map.

Unfortunately, Dr Ranjan is the incumbent union minister of state for external affairs but he is remaining silent over the matter today after he became a minister in the BJP government, Hareshwar said, while questioning the reason for his silence.

The BJP government also wrote a letter to the Centre on April 3, 2017, Hareshwar recalled, while demanding to know from the government if it got response to the letter regarding cross border encroachment in Haolenphai area.

He also questioned the stand of the state government over the matter.

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