Centre to hold tripartite meeting on Gorkha issues on April 2
Union minister of state for home affairs Nityanand Rai will preside over the meeting in Delhi. The last meeting was held in October 2021.
The Centre is likely to hold a tripartite meeting on April 2 to discuss issues related to Gorkhas after a gap of more than three years, officials aware of the development said.
Union minister of state for home affairs Nityanand Rai will preside over the meeting in Delhi. The last meeting was held in October 2021.
While the BJP and its alliance partners have welcomed the decision, others want clarity on the agenda of the meeting and attendees.
“The April 2 meeting would be a tripartite one and the Centre has already sent the invitation letter to the West Bengal government’s chief secretary. Elected representatives from Darjeeling, Terai and Dooars and Gorkha stake holders would also be attending the meeting,” Raju Bista, BJP’s Lok Sabha MP from Darjeeling, said.
The meeting comes amid the opposition’s attack on the BJP-led central government’s alleged indifference on the Gorkha issues despite the party winning the general elections from Darjeeling seat four times in a row since 2009.
The BJP has been in power in Darjeeling with the promise to look into the long pending demands of the Gorkhas, find permanent political solutions to their issues and accord Schedule Tribe status to the 11 left out Gorkha communities.
The Gorkha National Liberation Front (GNLF), the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) and the Communist Party of Revolutionary Marxists, which had supported the BJP in the last Lok Sabha election, have welcomed the Centre’s decision to hold the meeting next month.
However, SP Sharma, spokesperson of the Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha (BGPM), the largest party in Darjeeling hills that’s in power in the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration, said, “There is no clarity in the letter sent for the meeting. That the meeting would be chaired by the Union minister of state for home and not by Union home minister Amit Shah as done on October 12, 2021, is a testimony that the Centre is just hoodwinking the Gorkhas.”
