Assam-M'laya border row: West Khasi Hills claims territorial rights over 54 Langpih villages

Shillong, Oct 31: The Regional Committee for West Khasi Hills has claimed it has shared with Assam the documents to establish Meghalaya’s territorial right over the 54 villages under Langpih.

West Khasi Hills Regional Committee Chairman, Paul Lyngdoh told the press that the documents were shared during the last meeting held here recently.

“We have shared these documents and the response has been positive,” Lyngdoh said adding, both the regional committees (West Khasi Hills and Kamrup) need to jointly visit the disputed area and interact with the people there to know their mind.

Lyngdoh, however, added that efforts have been made to contact its Assam counterpart through different channels, including the Deputy Commissioner level, but there has been no response from Assam to conduct the joint survey.

Efforts are still on to establish contact and once the joint inspection of the area is done, the report would be submitted to the state government, he said. The regional committee of Assam would also similarly submit its report to the Assam government.

Lyngdoh however refrained to comment on how this issue would be resolved saying "a lot of details would be looked into" like contiguity, history, people’s opinion etc. and then a decision would be taken by both the state governments.

In the phase I of the vexed border row between the states, Meghalaya and Assam have already resolved six areas of differences and signed an agreement. Currently, there are six remaining disputed areas for which regional committees have been formed in both states and these are working to submit their reports.