What's behind the Assam-Mizoram border dispute?

 The boundary dispute between Assam and Mizoram dates back nearly 150 years. Boundary demarcations in 1875 and 1933, particularly the latter, are at the heart of the dispute. The 1933 boundary was made without consent and approval of government  authorities and the people of Mizoram.  The boundary dispute has simmered since Mizoram became a Union Territory in 1972 and then a state in the 1980s.

The dispute between Assam and Mizoram has recently escalated, as firing on the boundary left at least six Assam police dead and over 50 others injured.While Assam claims that its boundary has been transgressed, Mizoram cites unilateral moves by Assam inside its territory.   

Following a meeting with Union Home Minister Amit Shah,  Mizoram wants “the inter-state border issue with Assam be resolved in an atmosphere of peace and understanding". Twenty-four hours after the meeting, however, people are unable to travel through the border areas between Assam and Mizoram by vehicle. Mizoram blames Assam for blocking the road. According to Assam, Assam withdrew its travel advisory and  nobody is being stopped from travelling to Mizoram. 

Sources:

Deb, D. (2021). Explained: Why did a 150-year-old Assam-Mizoram dispute get violent now? The Indian Express. Retrieved 7 August 2021, from https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/the-assam-mizoram-dispute-violence-policemen-dead-7425600/.

Purkayastha, B. (2021). Bonhomie after Assam-Mizoram talks yet to reflect at border points. Hindustan Times. Retrieved 7 August 2021, from https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/bonhomie-after-assam-mizoram-talks-yet-to-reflect-at-border-points-101628280061118.html.

Comments on Anubhav Gupta’s article Will the World Accept India’s Hindu Nationalist Turn Under Modi?

While going through my email, I found this:

from: thebahuofbengal@gmail.com

to: comments@worldpoliticsreview.com, PolicyInstitute@asiasociety.org

date: Sep 23, 2019, 12:50 AM

subject: Comments on Anubhav Gupta’s article Will the World Accept India’s Hindu Nationalist Turn Under Modi?

Anubhav Gupta

Hello, I would like to comment on Anubhav Gupta’s article Will the World Accept India’s Hindu Nationalist Turn Under Modi? An excerpt was published on the Asia Society website. 

Comments:

• Abrogation of Article 370, which granted special status to Jammu & Kashmir, is long overdue. Residents of Jammu and Kashmir were subject to separate laws that gave them fewer rights and protections than other Indian citizens, without the protection of the Indian Constitution. 

• Residents of Ladakh have wanted Ladakh to become a Union Territory for years. They have complained of being socially, economically, and politically marginalized by state policies that favored the Kashmir Valley. 

• Between 1989 and 1991, over 350,000 Kashmiri Pandits (more than 95% of the Valley’s indigenous Hindu population) were driven from the Valley due to a Pakistan-sponsored insurgency and campaign of targeted killings, rape, threats, and destruction of properties and religious sites. They are displaced persons, often living in squalid conditions in the rest of India. 

• As far as National Register of Citizens (NRC) for the state of Assam is concerned, PTI News reported that the final NRC list left out over 19.6 lakh people, of which around 12 lakh (over 60%) are Hindus and Bengali Hindus. 

• Religious minorities suffer discrimination and even persecution in the Muslim majority states of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. It is fitting that India would give religious minorities from these countries expedited rights to become naturalized citizens under the Citizenship Amendment Bill. 

Mr. Gupta’s article vilified Hindu nationalism, Narendra Modi and the BJP. Sadly, Asia Society, ASPI and media in the U.S. and India promulgate this view. It pains me that someone with a Hindu name like Anubhav Gupta doesn’t stand up for Hindus.

Yours sincerely,
xxxxxxxx
Phone: xxx-xxx-xxxx

Sources:

• Gupta, A. (2019, September 19). Will the World Accept India's Hindu Nationalist Turn Under Modi? Retrieved from https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/28202/will-the-world-accept-india-s-hindu-nationalist-turn-under-modi 

• Gupta, A. (2019, September 19). Will the World Accept India's Hindu Nationalist Turn Under Modi? Retrieved from https://asiasociety.org/policy-institute/will-world-accept-indias-hindu-nationalist-turn-under-modi 

• Tapadar, P. (2019, September 22). Exclusion of Hindu Bengalis from Assam NRC changing political. Retrieved from http://ptinews.com/news/10867311_Exclusion-of-Hindu-Bengalis-from-Assam-NRC-changing-political.html 

• What You May Not Know About Kashmir and Articles 370/35A. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.hafsite.org/media/pr/what-you-may-not-know-about-kashmir-and-articles-37035a

China turns down India's proposal for joint mechanism on Brahmaputra - The New Indian Express

I feel a connection to the Brahmaputra River. In 1995, my husband and I visited Assam and even took a rafting trip on one of the Brahmputra's tributaries.  In 1998, I had the privilege of going to Tibet, where I traveled along the Yarlung Tsangpo River, as the river is known in its upper reaches.  Water issues concerning the river basin have since been of interest to me.

As I wrote in a previous post, Brahma Chellaney dedicated a whole chapter on the Tibetan Plateau in his book  Water: Asia's New Battleground.  He also discussed China's unwillingness to participate in transnational water commissions or international agreements.  It should come as no surprise then that China turns down India's proposal for joint mechanism on Brahmaputra.

The Ganges Brahmaputra River Basin area was created from the data set Hydrological basins in Southeast Asia.

The majority of the linework of the map was obtained by delineating drainage basin boundaries from hydrologically corrected elevation data with a resolution of 15 arc-seconds. The elevation dataset was part of a mapping product, HydroSHEDS, developed by the Conservation Science Program of World Wildlife Fund. Original input data had been obtained during NASA's Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM). Areas north of the SRTM extent, 60 degrees N, were obtained by merging with the HYDRO1k basin layer.

You may download a JPEG, PDF, or ArcMap document of the Ganges Brahmaputra River Basin.