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North-east keenly awaits PM's visit

Nitin Gogoi

There is a sense of déjà vu in the north-east over Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's two-day visit beginning January 21.

Vajpayee will be in Meghalaya capital Shillong to confer with the governors and chief ministers of the seven north-eastern states -- Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura. There are two main points on the agenda: development and security.

However, given the fact that Vajpayee's two immediate predecessors - H D Deve Gowda and Inder Kumar Gujral -- made whirlwind tours of the region, announced 'financial packages' worth more than Rs 60 billion for development and promptly forgot about it after returning to Delhi, has made many wary of prime ministerial visits. Says Silvious Condpon, opposition leader in the Assam assembly: "I hope Mr Vajpayee is not going to repeat what the two earlier prime ministers did. The north-east needs concrete steps, not empty promises."

Union home ministry officials, however, maintain that this time there would be no "packages" to be gifted. "Instead, the PM will concentrate on reviewing the on-going plans for overall development of the region and also look at the security aspect of the north-east," a joint secretary in the home ministry said.

According to officials, the meeting would be attended by Defence Minister George Fernandes, Home Minister Lal Kishenchand Advani, Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman KC Pant, secretaries of several departments, army chief VP Malik and top intelligence officials.

On Friday, the prime minister will meet with the governors and chief ministers of the region's states and discuss the developmental and financial issues.

According to Assam Chief Minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta, the precarious financial position of most of the region's states and ways to bail them out of it would be the main point of discussion. Most states in the region are currently bankrupt with many of them unable even to pay the salaries of their employees on time.

Top home ministry officials, however, told rediff.com: "The PM is more concerned about the massive leakage of funds that takes place in the north-east. He would try to impress upon the chief ministers the importance of reaching the funds right down to the grassroot which is not happening at the moment."

Corruption at the top is the biggest problem in the region with most of the funds getting misappropriated by top politicians, bureaucrats and businessmen. The meeting is likely to evolve a strategy for optimum utilisation of the funds.

"Henceforth the Centre is likely to insist on ground-level inspection of schemes for which funds are earmarked. Special Central teams will be deputed to carry out the inspection and only after their report is received, further instalments will be released," a home ministry official said. The Centre's concern over misappropriation of funds is understandable. There is no visible improvement in the states of the region despite a massive Rs 120 billion that is pumped in every year in the north-east.

The other big worry is the law and order situation in the region. Although insurgencies in many states are at a low ebb at the moment, rising influx of illegal migrants from Bangladesh and the increasing activities of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence is being seen as an alarming development.

Many home ministry officials believe that the next flashpoint after Kashmir is the north-east.

Under the circumstances, Vajpayee's two-day sojourn is keenly awaited by the people and the administrators of the region.

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