GUWAHATI, June 25 ? The all-party conference convened by the Congress government in Assam to evolve a consensus on demarcation of the boundary of the proposed Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) today agreed to include additional 126 villages in the tribal council as per the demand of Bodo Liberation Tiger (BLT) and its allies. However, the problem of demarcating the BTC boundary could not be solved entirely by today?s all-party meeting chaired by the Chief Minister, Tarun Gogoi, as no consensus could be arrived at about the status of another 141 villages demanded for inclusion in the BTC by the BLT.
Talking to the newsmen after the meeting was over, Assam Health Minister, Dr Bhumidhar Barman who is the chairman of the Cabinet sub-committee on the BTC issue, informed that all the political parties barring the Purbanchaliya Loka Parishad (PLP) agreed to include 126 more villages in the BTC to pave way for permanent solution to the vexed Bodo problem. However, the PLP, a regional party having only one member on Assam Assembly, opposed the formation of the BTC at all as it feels the BTC would be detrimental to the preservation of rights of non-Bodos living in proposed BTC areas. The CPM has agreed ?in principle? to inclusion of additional 126 villages in the BTC, but maintained that it will like to know the population pattern of those additional villages to be included in the proposed tribal council as per the demand of the BLT.
Out of these 126 villages, 107 were among those 353 villages which were excluded from Bodoland Autonomous Council (BAC) area by State government in 1999 by a notification. The rest 19 villages of the 126 villages which all the parties on Tuesday decided to include in the BTC, are towards the east of Pachnoi river. It may be mentioned that in 1999 the then AGP government excluded total 353 villages from the BAC. But the BLT during the course of the peace-talks with the Government of India and Assam government since March, 2000, have been demanding reinclusion of 248 villages out of these while agreeing to give up claim on 105 villages. Of these 248 villages, the BLT said that there would be no compromise on particular 107 villages ? which were agreed for inclusion in the BTC by the all-party meeting on Tuesday ? while they agreed to negotiate on the rest 141 villages.
As the all-party meeting today could not arrive at any consensus on the fate of these 141 villages, the problem of demarcation of the BTC boundary was far from over. Regarding BLT?s demand for inclusion of Manas and Orang National Parks in the BTC, Dr Bhumidhar Barman said it was agreed upon by the State government and there was no opposition to it. Dr Barman said the all-party meting did not decided on the BLT?s demand for inclusion of Bijni Town in Bongaigaon district along with six other villages and said that the State government was for including only two villages out of these in the BTC.
While saying that Assam government may consider inclusion of three more villages in Srirampur area in Kokrajhar district in the BTC, Dr Barman said that it was upto the Centre to decide on the BLT?s demand for inclusion of the National Highway section passing through Bodo areas in the BTC. It is pertinent to mention that it was the second round of all-party meeting convened on BTC issue by the present Congress government in Assam. The second round was necessitated after the Centre under pressure from the BLT and its allies told Assam government to reconsider the resolution taken in the earlier all-party meeting to consider the boundary of the existing BAC as the boundary of the proposed BTC.
Meanwhile, the BLT has issued warning that it was not going to sit in the next round tri-partite talks in case the Centre fails to come up with something ?concrete? to solve the Bodo tangle through formation of the BTC under amended Sixth Schedule of the Indian Constitution. The BLT has participated in 14 rounds of formal tri-partite talks since March 2000.