Mainland’s attitude towards NE must change: economist

By A Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI, March 30 –

There is an indifferent attitude, almost of a colonial type, in the mainland of India towards NE. This needs to be changed through an arrangement so as to remove the feeling of alienation that afflicts the psyche of the NE people and thus to save the integrity of the country. For the purpose, the Rajya Sabha should be turned into a true council of States with a decisive say on the Union Budget.

This was the observation made by Dr Ashok Mitra, one of the leading economists of the country and a former Chief Economic Advisor to the Government of India. Also a former Finance Minister of West Bengal, Dr Mitra was delivering the Foundation Day lecture of the Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change and Development here today on ‘Seven Sisters and Federal Polity’.

For the feeling of alienation of the NE people, he said, the people of the mainland and the country’s policymakers are to be blamed. There are, however, three distinctions geographical, historical and ethnic – which also distinguish the region from the mainland of the country, he said.

But if NE is regarded as a part of the country in all respects, then it should be allowed to enjoy all the facilities available for development. The NE region, which constitutes 15 per cent of the country’s landmarks with five per cent of the country’s population living in it, should be offered the same pledge and scope for development as has been made for Kashmir, said Dr Mitra.

At present, the region hardly makes three per cent contribution to the gross domestic product of the country. The North Eastern Council (NEC) has also failed to bring about a change in the situation.

The water resources of the Brahmaputra, one of the most magnificent of the rivers, have also not been harnessed for the agricultural development ofthe region. No body has bothered to apply his mind to use the rich forest resources of this region.

The road building operations carried out by different organisations in this region are meant to facilitate movement of troops, not to further its economic development. The priority in this areas is on maintaining territorial integrity of the country, not on accelerating development, he said.

In the political arena also, only a few personalities like Fakhrudding Ali ahmed, Devakanta Borooah, PA Sangma and Bijoy Bhagawati, were given national status.

There must be something wrong with our constitution. An important limb of the country is neglected in terms of development and political position.

Though the Constiution of the country has described India as a Union of States, the imagination of the makers of the Constitution dried up after taking up the nomenclature of the Rajya Sabha from the American model of the Senate, he said.

This is why, five per cent of the nation’s population has representation in the Rajya Sabha according to its size. The pledges of the Constitution makers to make the Rajya Sabha a forum to discuss the problems of the States and making it a House of elders have also been forgotten.
The convention that a person should be a resident of the State concerned to represent it in the Rajya Sabha has also been obliterated with a recent amendment to the Constitution.

Therefore, to keep the integrity of the country intact, there is a need to amend the Constitution so as to give equal representation to each of the States in the Rajya Sabha and also to give this forum the prerogative on the money bills (budget). This will provide the NE region with a better scope to assert itself, Dr Mitra said.

The Rajya Sabha should also be given the power to appoint the Finance Commission members and to determine its terms of reference. Besides, the Planning Commission should be made a Constitutional body and appointment of its members should be the prerogrative of the Rajya Sabha, he said.

The function was conducted by former bureaucrat Jatin Hazarika.

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