Arunachal: Sonia dotes on bio-diversity, ‘peace’

While insurgency and militancy could be resolved only through discussions and consensus, India’s ‘‘Look East’’ poli...

While insurgency and militancy could be resolved only through discussions and consensus, India’s ‘‘Look East’’ policy could bring about a sea-change in the economy of the Northeast including Arunachal Pradesh, Congress president and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi said here today.

Addressing a 10,000-strong crowd, massive by Arunachal Pradesh standards, on the nineteenth statehood day, Gandhi also assured that the Manmohan Singh government was keen to reopen traditional trade routes with Tibet, Myanmar and Bhutan.

Though her 13-minute-long speech in Hindi contained more about what Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi did for the emergence of the erstwhile North East Frontier Agency (NEFA) into full-fledged state of Arunachal Pradesh in 1987, the Congress president also stressed that care should be taken so that rapid development programmes did not disturb the rich bio-diversity of the state.

‘‘The UPA government is committed towards rapid development of the Northeast including Arunachal Pradesh. It was Rajiv Gandhi who had accelerated the development process by signing the Mizoram, Tripura and Assam accords. I am glad the people of Arunachal Pradesh elected the Congress back to power last year,’’ she said.

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