New Delhi: The central government on Tuesday assured of implementing all clauses of the historic Bodo accord before 2024, said a member of Bodo delegation. A Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) delegation called on Piyush Goyal, additional secretary in the Home Ministry, and discussed the issue.
“The Home Ministry assured us that it will take all necessary steps for implementation of the accord. We hope all clauses of the accord will be implemented by the central government at the earliest,” said Dipen Boro, a member of the Bodo delegation and added “we were assured that all clauses of the accord will be implemented before 2024.”
The Bodo delegation also appealed to the central government to take all necessary steps to ensure early release of jailed leaders of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB).
All signatories of BTR accord including its chief Pramod Boro, Gobinda Basumatary, general secretary (NDFB-progressive), Assam chief secretary Pawan Kumar Borthakur, ADGP (Law & Order) Hiren Chandra Nath, principle secretary Neeraj Verma, MHA additional secretary (North East) Piyush Goal and several other officials were present in the meeting.
Members of the All Bodo Students Union (ABSU) who were present in the meeting also demanded to take up the matter seriously for release of all the former jailed National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) members categorically without any condition so as to ensure peace and harmony in the region.
The delegation members also demanded release of 74 jailed NDFB leaders (convicted under life imprisonment, death penalty) from central jail in Guwahati and other districts of Assam under CBI and NIA cases. The Bodo Accord was signed on January 27, 2020 between Bodo representatives, Assam government and central government.
“Bodo Peace Accord (BTR Agreement) is going to complete its three year period on 27" January, 2023. Our concern is that some of the key clauses of the accord are yet to be implemented for which Government of India, Government of Assam, and Bodo movement groups came together into the commitment during the signing of BTR Accord to safeguard the Constitutional and Political rights & privileges of the Bodo and tribal people living in BTR and to augment the area with enhancement of more legislative, executive, administrative and financial powers of existing BTR council,” said Dipen Boro.
