[Assam] Look East Policy and development of North East

Sat Feb 3 00:17:02 EST 2007

Hello C'da

I was also at the seminar on LEP as part on the sponsors. In the security
session KPS Gill (former DGP of Assam, Punjab, CRPF)  Sunil Nath (former
ULFA  publicity secretary) Kirip Chaliha (MP, Congress) Arun Sarma (MP. AGP)
Nitin Gokhle (Editor NDTV) were present.

KPS Gill said during 62-64 during his stint as SP in Nagaon, he had thrown
out more Bangladeshis (East Pakistanis, EP then) than 10 years of AGP rule
(winking at Dr. Arun Sarma, who was sitting next to him). He used to take
the refugees to camps near the border.Tthe EPs used to throw out Hindus from
the border areas, thereby creating a crisis. At Nehru's behest, a home
minister level meeting was held between India and Pakistan, and Nehru
instructed  'no more evictions of EPs'. Gill and Bishnu Ram Medhi, then CM
wrote a letter to Nehru stating the grave danger this decision will pose in
future. Nehru decided not to act on the letter. He also said that Assam had
a long  string of very honest CMs from Gopinath Bordoloi to Sarat Ch Sinha.

He said in '64 Nagaon had a clearly demarcated Hindu -Muslim area and a
line. Assamese Muslims had no problem. and relationship was very cordial. He
had to set up special police station to protect a lone Hindu village near
Muslim areas. When he visited the area in 74 the Muslim line had advanced by
15 km and Borduwa, the birth place of Sankaradeva was overran. He was sorry
to use the communal sounding words but he said these situations are better
explained by  using the right word. When in 80s Indira Gandhi decided to
bring in the army, KPS opposed it and suggested that police be trained and
strengthened to deal with the situations. On the contrary, the army moved in
and now they will never move out as it is an industry for them.

KPS also used to write poetry in the IIllustrated Weekly of India, which was
disclosed by Kirip Chaliha. Supercop preferred to keep the poetic part a
secret

Nitin Gokhle of NDTV was also candid. He said we are unnecessarily giving
too much credit to ISI. Actually he said the DGFI of Bangladesh and certain
functionaries of the establishment  are dead against India and are capable
of fomenting trouble in India without ISI. After partition as per groupings
Assam was to goto EP, that they have not forgotten. Even Mujib in his
autobiography has written that Bangladesh will need Assam's fertile valley
to support its hugely expanding population. They see denial of Assam to EP
as a historical deceit to deprive them of the north east. The Bangladesh
Ranger boss who engineered the butchering of  BSF Jawans a few years  back
claims in his recent book  that  Assam will  be theirs' one day.

Nitin said that when you look east from Delhi, first you see is Bangladesh.
Bangladesh will not allow India a transit  because it feels  India did not
give  it a transit route to  Nepal  once. Bangladesh will never give the
transit to India, be it through river Brahmaputra or Trans Asian
Highway/Railway. Their policy is that if they can throttle the Northeast,
the region will suffer from underdevelopment and India will have limited
access through the chicken's neck. The chicken nack is so crowded now that
only 1.2 km is available for public works, you cannot build a transmission
line to evacuate the huge hydro power of Arunachal, even if it is exploited.

In the inaugural address Mr Jairam Ramesh, MoS (Commerce) admitted that the
infrastructure is pathetic and LEP has miles to go. He said that LEP needs a
byepass surgery on Bangladesh. Govt. of India is going to develop Akyab port
by investing 100m $. Govt. is also going to fund Rs. 2500 crore in Assam to
replant the ageing tea plants.

-manoj

On 2/2/07, Chan Mahanta <cmahanta at charter.net> wrote:
>
>  It will be interesting to hear what the powers that be might have to say
> about this.
>
> Maybe Hazarika will forward it to the 'hard-hitting' minister to get some
> answers.But I won't hold my breath.
>
>
> >There is nobody to redress.
>
> There never was. And  I cannot imagine when it will be there under the
> prevailing system.
>
>
> All the big talk about industries and entrepreneurship are always from
> people who never held a hammer in his life, or ever had to produce anything
> to make a living.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> At 10:25 PM +0530 2/2/07, mc mahant wrote:
>
> Look East Policy is yet a farce.
>
> Look what insults/losses I suffered in the last month:
>
> With expensive bank loans I ordered 2 MIG/MAG 630 Amp Welding Machines ex
> Tianjin China@ $1510 FOB.
>
> As I wanted  to do some critical construction job I asked them to
> Airfreight   the machines to L.G.N.B.International Airport,Guwahati via
> Bangkok. No airlines would carry there. So I said--via Delhi  then(They care
> for the EAST and Care Dearly for the North East!-I THOUGHT).
>
> Only Korean Air will carry the cargo--gross 200 Kg~ -- and they charged
> $680. These arrived Delhi on 15 January. On one pretext or the other("Why
> are you buying Chinese", "We don't accept E-mail" This Print is Hazy"----)
> these were not released till today -after paying 37.5% DutyonC.I.F. and
> "Delayed  Collection charges". In spite Of "Hon'ble Finance Minister
> announcing Pre-Budget      "We are pleased to reduce Duty on Capital goods
> from 10% down t0 5% (on FOB).There is nobody to redress.
> NEDFI-DONER-OXOMmp's-Assam Govt-Look East--all are Bekaar!
>
> "Look East-" is also copied from Willy Brandt's Drang nach Osten(towards
> USSR) in '70s .
>
> "Look East " will be real only in Sovereign Oxom where the main Trade will
> be from Kakopothar  to Chengdu in 70 minute hops.
>
> And when bargeloads of Yunnan Phosphorites will travel  Da-li to Mytkina
> -to Patkoi-to Luit valley daily.
>
> mm
>
> P.S. Pradip -maybe you would copy this to your big address list -to whom
> you posted the original
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> From:  *Pradip Kumar Datta <pradip200 at yahoo.com>*
> To:  *love4india at yahoogroups.com, assam at assamnet.org,NorthEastIndia <
> NorthEastIndia at yahoogroups.com>,neglectedindia at yahoogroups.com,"
> beautifulindia at yahoogroups.com" <beautifulindia at yahoogroups.com>,"
> harmoniusindia at yahoogroups.com" <harmoniusindia at yahoogroups.com>,"
> ignited-mind at yahoogroups.com" <ignited-mind at yahoogroups.com>,Wake up India
> <arkitectindia at yahoogroups.com>,"india-force at yahoogroups.com" <
> india-force at yahoogroups.com>,"india-unity at yahoogroups.com" <
> india-unity at yahoogroups.com>,"india_action_team at yahoogroups.com" <
> india_action_team at yahoogroups.com>,"indiaandtheworld at yahoogroups.com" <
> indiaandtheworld at yahoogroups.com>, "indianjustice at yahoogroups.com" <
> indianjustice at yahoogroups.com>,"indiansecularism at yahoogroups.com" <
> indiansecularism at yahoogroups.com>, "indianthinkers at yahoogroups.com" <
> indianthinkers at yahoogroups.com>,"indianwhistleblowers at yahoogroups.com"<
> indianwhistleblowers at yahoogroups.com>, "indiashines at yahoogroups.com" <
> indiashines at yahoogroups.com>,"indiathinkersnet at yahoogroups.com" <
> indiathinkersnet at yahoogroups.com>, "issuesonline at yahoogroups.com" <
> issuesonline at yahoogroups.com>,"national_awareness at yahoogroups.com" <
> national_awareness at yahoogroups.com>*
> Subject:  *[Assam] Look East Policy and development of North East*
> Date:  *Fri, 19 Jan 2007 04:28:55 -0800 (PST)*
>
>
> *Look East Policy and development of North East
> **— Rejaul Karim Laskar*
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *T*he agreement reached during the fifth India-ASEAN Summit held in Cebu,
> Phillippines on January 14, 2007 on the proposed Free Trade Agreement– which
> will be ready by July 2007– is a significant achievement of the Look East
> Policy. It is to be hoped that such a free trade agreement will open the
> door to new opportunities for the development of North East which has been
> stagnating due to lack of economic development for the last six decades.
> With the establishment of India-ASEAN Free Trade Area, the North East will
> no longer be handicapped by the Physical inaccessibility from the rest of
> India, the way it has been for the past six decades. Rather, it will be the
> centre of this vast Free Trade Area
>
> which may, in all probability, be one of the largest and most dynamic free
> trade areas of the world in the twenty-first century.
>
> Though in the first phase of the 'Look East Policy' - unveiled by the
> Narsimha Rao Government in the early nineties– the Government of India
> focused on renewing political and economic contacts with the countries of
> East and South-East Asia, in the second phase of this policy the Government
> of India is giving special emphasis on the economic development of backward
> north eastern region of India taking advantage of huge market of ASEAN as
> well as of the energy resources available in some of the member countries of
> ASEAN like Myanmar.
>
> The 'Look East Policy' started achieving success as early as in 1992. In
> January 1992, India became able to establish the first institutional linkage
> with ASEAN by becoming a sectoral dialogue partner of ASEAN in specific
> areas like trade, investment, science and technology and training. The
> institutional
>
> linkage was upgraded in 1995 when India became a full dialogue partner of
> ASEAN. In 1996 the institutional linkage was further upgraded when India was
> admitted in ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF)– which deals with security issues and
> has a tremendous clout in Asia Pacific region. India also became a founder
> member of East Asia Summit and has participated in both first East Asia
> Summit held in December 2005 and the just concluded second East Asia Summit
> held on January 15, 2007. But upgradation of institutional linkage with
> South East Asia is not the only benefit of the Look East Policy, but more
> importantly, this policy has led to a steady expansion of India's trade and
> investment links with the East and South East Asia region. From a meagre $
> 2.5 billion in 1993-94, India-ASEAN trade is now more than $21 billion.
>
> But the most important beneficiary of this Look East Policy will,
> obviously be the north eastern region of India. In the second phase of the
> Look East Policy
>
> the Government of India is giving special emphasis on the development of
> North East by taking advantage of the physical contiguity of this region
> with the ASEAN. With the admission of Myanmar into ASEAN in 1997, North East
> has now become India's gateway to ASEAN. As the process of establishment of
> India-ASEAN Free Trade Area progresses North East will have the potential to
> become the hub of this future growth engine of Asia. But, of course, road,
> rail and air linkages will have to be improved to realise this potential.
> This is the reason why the Government of India is giving special emphasis on
> improving the road connectivity between North East and Myanmar by investing
> in transport infrastructure in North East as well as in Myanmar. India and
> Thailand have also planned a trilateral project with Myanmar to link the
> three nations through a road corridor. The India-ASEAN car rally held in
> November 2004 was also a conscious effort to strengthen the road linkages
> between ASEAN
>
> and the North East.
>
> The ASEAN-India Partnership for peace, progress and shared prosperity pact
> signed by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh with leaders of the ASEAN
> countries at the third India-ASEAN summit on Vientine on November 30, 2004,
> which outlined a multi-pronged action plan for boosting trade, investment,
> tourism, culture, sports and people to people contact will not only go a
> long way towards economic integration between India and ASEAN but will also
> facilitate development of the North East. The plan to 'build institutional
> linkages for intelligence and information sharing, exchange of information
> and cooperation in legal and enforcement matters' and to 'explore developing
> anti-terrorism cooperation and assistance packages covering among others
> immigration control, customs cooperation, land, air and sea safety' will
> contribute immensely to curbing terrorism in North East.
>
> Another dimension of Look East Policy is the Bay of Bengal Initiative for
>
> Multi-Sectoral Economic and Technological Cooperation (BIMSTEC)
> established in June 1997 as BIST-EC (Bangladesh-India- Sri Lanka-Thailand
> Economic Co-operation) but renamed as BIMST-EC (Bangladesh-India-Myanmar-Sri
> Lanka-Thailand– Economic Co-operation) in December 1997 and again renamed as
> Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi Sectoral Economic and Technological
> Cooperation (BIMSTEC) in July 2004. Presently its members are Bangladesh,
> India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Bhutan and Nepal. The members of this
> grouping have also been working for quite some time for a Free Trade
> Agreement among themselves. But the postponement of the second BIMSTEC
> Summit, which was scheduled to be held on February 8, 2007 has given a
> setback to this endeavour. Incidentally, the North East lies at the centre
> of both the proposed India-ASEAN Free Trade Area and the BIMSTEC Free Trade
> Area and has the potential to be a hub of these two future growth engines of
> Asia.
>
> (Source: Assam Tribune 19th January 2007)
>
>  ------------------------------
>
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-- 
Manoj Kumar Das
C 172 Gr Floor
Sarvodaya Enclave
New Delhi 110017
Tel: 91 11 26533824
Telefax: 91 11 26533829
Hand Phone: 91 9312650558

Be so unselfish that when God writes your destiny; he can be free to ask:
What do you want?
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