Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Monday that in the past nine years, the government had ended “border, ethnic and religious” disputes in the northeast.
Mr. Shah said that in the last nine years, the government had signed nine peace agreements under which more than 9,000 youths had given up arms and joined the mainstream.
He said the Armed Forces (Special) Powers Act (AFSPA) had been removed from more than 70% of the area.
“The Narendra Modi government has spent ₹14 lakh crore on infrastructure development in the northeast in just 10 years between 2014 and 2024. Today, rail and air connectivity works are going on in all the States of the northeast,” he said.
Mr. Shah delivered a lecture on “Security Beyond Tomorrow: Forging India’s Resilient Future” at an event organised by the Observers Research Foundation (ORF).
‘Appeasement policy’
He said the appeasement policy of the previous governments had created many problems for the country. “There was violence and unrest in Jammu and Kashmir, left-wing extremist-affected areas, and in the northeast for decades due to several wrong policies. India shares a land border with six countries and a maritime border with seven countries. In 75 years, we have faced terrorism, extremism, and left-wing extremism on the internal security front, and thousands of innocent civilians and security personnel have become victims of these. Since 2014, the Modi government has adopted the policy of zero tolerance and made a strategy to completely eliminate terrorism,” Mr. Shah said.
He said the year 2024 was also important for the whole world because this year elections were going to be held in 40 democratic countries and about 3.3 billion people would vote in these elections. Nearly 1 billion voters of India would also vote in the Lok Sabha elections. He said people would celebrate the festival of democracy in a very good manner in India, the world’s oldest and largest democracy.
