More autonomy assured for northeast tribals’ councils

AGARTALA - The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government is keen to give more autonomy to the autonomous district councils in northeast India for the development of the tribals, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs V. Narayanasamy said Tuesday.

“Congress governments, both at the centre and states, are always sincere for the development of tribals and to grant more autonomy to the backward tribals,” he told reporters here.

In the northeast, there are 16 tribal autonomous district councils (ADCs) - constitutional autonomous bodies to facilitate the socio-economic development of tribals, who constitute 26.93 percent of the northeast’s total population of 38,857,769 (2001 census). Of the 16 ADCs, six are in Manipur, three each in Assam, Meghalaya and Mizoram and one in Tripura.

Narayanasamy, who is also a Congress general secretary, was in Tripura to supervise the party’s organisational activities ahead of the May 3 elections to the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC).

“Late prime minister Indira Gandhi and the Congress had taken bold steps to constitute these ADCs in northeast India,” he said, charging the Left Front government in Tripura with utterly failing to ensure the development of the tribals and to solve their problems.

“The CPI-M (Communist Party of India-Marxist)-led Left Front government has been allocating fewer funds for the tribals even though they (tribals) constitute one-third of Tripura’s 3.5 million population,” the minister said.

Criticising the Left Front government, Narayanasamy said that due to its misrule, Tripura has been lagging in many sectors compared to the other northeastern states.

His remarks drew an angry response from the CPI-M.

Terming the allegations as “rubbish”, CPI-M Tripura state committee secretary Bijon Dhar asked: “If Indira Gandhi had constitute the ADC in Tripura, why the Congress had boycotted the first ADC elections in 1985?”

“After a long struggle by the CPI-M and its frontal organisations, the ADC had been constituted in 1982, and the Left Front government had over the years strengthened the autonomous body. We want to give more power to ADC,” Dhar, also a CPI-M central committee member, told reporters.

“Congress is responsible for the backwardness of the tribals across the country,” he alleged.