What: North Eastern Council Repositioning
Why: Union Home Minister as ex-officio Chairman
When: June 13, 2018
- The Central Government has re-positioned the North Eastern Council (NEC) – a statutory body with Governors and Chief Ministers of all the eight North Eastern States as its Member.
- The Union Cabinet on June 13, 2018 has approved the proposal of Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) in this regard.
- The Union Home Minister has been nominated as ex-officio Chairman of North Eastern Council (NEC) . The Cabinet also approved that Minister of State (Independent Charge), Ministry of DoNER would serve as Vice Chairman of the Council.
Impact of Repositioning
- North Eastern Council (NEC) implements various projects through the State and Central agencies.
- Under the new arrangement with Home Minister as Chairman and Minister of DoNER as Vice Chairman, NEC and all the Governors and Chief Ministers of North Eastern States as Member would provide a forum for discussing inter-state matters more comprehensively and also consider common approaches to be taken in future.
- NEC can now also perform the tasks undertaken by the various Zonal Councils to discuss such inter-State issues as drug trafficking, smuggling of arms and ammunition, boundary disputes etc.
- This repositioning of NEC will help it to become a more effective body for the North Eastern Region.
- The Council shall, from time to time, review the implementation of the projects/schemes included in the project; recommend effective measures for coordination among the state Governments for these projects etc. The Council shall have such powers as may be delegated to it by the Central Government.
About North Eastern Council (NEC)
- NEC was established under the North Eastern Council Act, 1971 by an Act of Parliament as an apex level body for securing balanced and coordinated development and facilitating coordination with the States.
- The North Eastern Council is the nodal agency for the economic and social development of the North Eastern Region which consists of the eight States of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura.
- Subsequent to the Amendment of 2002, NEC has been mandated to function as a regional planning body for the North Eastern Area and while formulating a regional plan for this area, shall give priority to the schemes and projects benefiting two or more states provided that in the case of Sikkim, the Council shall formulate specific projects and schemes for that State
