Cabinet approves Repositioning of North Eastern Council

The Union Cabinet has approved proposal of Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) for nomination of Union Home Minister as ex-officio Chairman of North Eastern Council (NEC). It also approved that Minister of State (Independent Charge), Ministry of DoNER will serve as Vice Chairman of NEC.

Key Facts

NEC is statutory body with Governors and Chief Ministers of all eight North Eastern State as its members which implements various projects through State and Central agencies. The repositioning of NEC will help it to become more effective body for North Eastern Region (NER).
Under new arrangement with Home Minister as Chairman and Minister of DoNER as Vice Chairman will provide forum for discussing inter-state matters more comprehensively and also consider common approaches to be taken in future.
NEC now can perform tasks undertaken by various Zonal Councils to discuss such inter-State issues as smuggling of arms and ammunition, drug trafficking, boundary disputes etc.
NEC will also review from time to time implementation of the projects and schemes included in project. It will also recommend effective measures for coordination among state Governments for these projects etc. NEC will also have such powers as may be delegated to it by the Central Government.

Background

NEC is statutory body established under North Eastern Council (NEC) Act, 1971 as an apex level body for securing balanced and coordinated development and facilitating coordination with states. It has been mandated to function as regional planning body for NER .It gives priority to schemes and projects while formulating regional plan for this area benefiting two or more states. In case of Sikkim, NEC formulates specific projects and schemes for that State.

Month: Current Affairs - June, 2018