Arunachal Cong chief meets Kharge, seeks support on critical state issues
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Itanagar: Arunachal Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) president Bosiram Siram on Thursday met Congress president
Mallikarjun Kharge
in New Delhi and sought the party's support on several critical issues affecting the frontier state.
During the meeting, Siram sought the party's support on the need to amend Article 371(H), opposition to the proposed 11,000MW Siang Upper Multipurpose Project (SUMP), and the restoration of the Old Pension Scheme (OPS).
The APCC also submitted a memorandum outlining concerns over what it termed as the "inadequate" constitutional safeguards provided under Article 371(H) of the Arunachal Pradesh Statehood Act, 1986.
The provision, Siram said, fails to protect tribal customs, land ownership rights and the interests of indigenous communities in terms of natural resource management. He contrasted this with stronger protections available to neighbouring states such as Nagaland and Mizoram under Articles 371(A) and 371(G) and urged the party to push for constitutional amendments.
Raising the alarm over the proposed SUMP, Siram informed Kharge that the 11,000-MW mega dam with a proposed height of over 300 metres poses a serious threat to the ecology, cultural heritage, and demographics of the Siang region.
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He warned that more than 27 villages could be submerged, displacing nearly 1.5 lakh indigenous people, and leading to irreversible environmental damage. He flagged concerns over the use of Central Armed Police Forces to push forward survey and drilling activities without the Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) of local communities — a move he described as reminiscent of "colonial-style dominance".
While reiterating the Congress' commitment to development, he maintained that such projects should not come at the cost of indigenous lives, livelihoods, and heritage. "We are not against development, but we are against destructive development," he said.
Siram further called for the rollback of the New Pension Scheme (NPS) and the reinstatement of the OPS, arguing that the NPS leaves govt employees vulnerable to market fluctuations and fails to guarantee post-retirement security.
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