Governor J J Singh brings Arunachal’s voice to Delhi

NEW DELHI, APRIL 6 : An Arunachal Pradesh MP left quite a few red faces in Parliament recently when he said they could approach Beijing for a rail line if Delhi couldn’t deliver. Now, the state has found an unusual votary in Governor J J Singh. While it’s chief ministers who are known to chase state-specific developmental issues in New Delhi’s power corridors, the former Army Chief has taken up that role for the easternmost frontier state.

Since he moved into Arunachal Pradesh Raj Bhavan two months ago, Singh has held one-on-one meetings with Union Ministers for Tourism, Civil Aviation, Communications and Information Technology, Defence, Surface Transport and Railways, presenting the state’s aspirations, showcasing its potential and demanding its due.

The General’s ideas range from opening up the Mechuka and Tawang sectors to foreign tourists and fast-tracking the work on a greenfield airport at Tawang, to getting Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd to provide mobile telecommunication in Arunachal’s border areas and relaxing Restricted Area Permit (RAP) and Protected Area Permit (PAP) for foreign tourists, while simultaneously streamlining the system of issuing Inner Line Permits (ILPs) to Indian nationals.

And one of the primary items on Singh’s agenda is a railway line. During his meeting with Railways Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav, the General gave the example of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway to make his point on economic viability versus social and strategic needs.

Singh is learnt to have impressed upon Lalu the strategic significance of a railway line, citing the challenge of “troop movement”. He also quoted news reports from Chinese agencies saying China was moving towards building a rail line to the Tibetan town of Chomo, near a Himalayan border pass to Sikkim.

At a recent meeting with Tourism Minister Ambika Soni, Singh strongly advocated relaxing the norms for foreign tourists, asking her to play a “dominant role” in convincing the Centre on this. “For Arunachal Pradesh, our immediate need is to open up the Mechuka and Tawang sectors to foreign tourists,” he is learnt to have told Soni.

Singh also informed her that the Arunachal Government had initiated the process for a daily helicopter service to Tawang.

Emphasising the need to make issuing of ILPs citizen-friendly, the Governor suggested to the Tourism Ministry a round-the-clock process, with the use of information technology. Singh also reminded Soni of her ministry’s in-principle nod to setting up 18 helipads at a cost of Rs 9 crore, and sought an early sanction to the project.

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