Assam, Meghalaya sign historic agreement to resolve 50-year-old boundary dispute
Mar 29, 2022
New Delhi [India], March 29 : Assam and Meghalaya governments on Tuesday signed a historic agreement here in the national capital to resolve their 50-year-old pending boundary difference.
The agreement was signed by the Chief Ministers of Assam and Meghalaya in the presence of Union Home Minister Amit Shah at the office of the Ministry of Home Affairs.
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and his Meghalaya counterpart Conrad K Sangma signed the agreement in the presence of the chief secretaries of both the states as well as other officials of these states and the officials of MHA.
The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between Assam and Meghalaya two months after a draft resolution was submitted by the Chief Ministers of both states to Shah on January 31 for examination and consideration by the MHA.
The governments of Assam and Meghalaya had come up with a draft resolution to resolve their border disputes in six of the 12 "areas of difference" along the 884-km boundary.
According to the proposed recommendations for the 36.79 square km of land, Assam will keep 18.51 square km and give the remaining 18.28 square km to Meghalaya.
The agreement between Assam and Meghalaya is significant as the boundary dispute between the two states has been pending for a very long time.
The long-standing land dispute was sparked in 1972 when Meghalaya was carved out of Assam. The border issues came as a result of different readings of the demarcation of boundaries in the initial agreement for the new state's creation.
