This Week Northeast: Fly to the border

Saving a river

A campaign to save two rivers from pollution and encroachment has started to build up in Shillong. The ‘Save Umkhrah and Umshyrpi River Campaign’,which has been on for the past several months,drew a huge crowd as it peaked this week. Members from a butchers’ association,government officials,school and college students,NGOs,ex-servicemen,women’s organisations as well as political parties took part in a rally for the rivers. While people spoke about stringent laws,a local music band also came up with Khasi songs that glorify rivers as lifelines of the community.

Sermons of peace

Kohima was agog last week with the platinum jubilee of the Nagaland Baptist Church Council,a five-day event that witnessed a huge turnout of Nagas who love peace. The NBCC jubilee underlined this in the resolutions that it adopted on the concluding day. While one of these resolutions expressed concern over “the unresolved protracted Naga political issue and the sporadic eruption of armed conflicts”,another called for an end to “forcible collections,intimidation,undisciplined behaviour of some cadres,and human rights

violations.”

Sikkim success

Sikkim,still recovering from last year’s earthquake,had something to cheer about this week . The state has won national awards in five categories and a total sum of Rs 1.36 crore for performing well in the panchayati raj sector. This also made Sikkim the topper in the small states category for its outstanding performance in strengthening and developing the panchayati raj institutions in the state. The awards were given away in the national capital by Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh on Tuesday.