Assam, Mizoram Officials Meet After Rubber Plantation Damage at Border
The flare-up sits within a decades-old Mizoram–Assam boundary dispute stemming from conflicting colonial-era maps, with no ground demarcation.
Overview
- Deputy commissioners and police chiefs from Mamit in Mizoram and Hailakandi in Assam met in Bairabi on Monday to ease tensions following the August 15 incident.
- Officials agreed to strengthen preventive arrangements on the ground and to escalate the matter to higher authorities for further review.
- Mamit deputy commissioner K. Laltlawmlova said the site falls under the Kawrtha forest division and appears on a Mizoram EFCC GIS map, asserting local usage rights in the reserved forest area.
- Hailakandi deputy commissioner Abhishek Jain maintained the location lies in the Gharmura inner line reserve forest under the Reserved Forest Act, 1980, citing section 2A and warning that plantations within 1.5 km of Assam could draw National Green Tribunal scrutiny.
- Mizoram officials reported that Assam police and forest personnel damaged about 290 rubber plants near Saikhawthlir, part of the state’s Chief Minister's Rubber Mission.