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North East: Power struggle in Arunachal Pradesh : Apang is finally ousted

	April 16, 2007

Five-time Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Gegong Apang is finally ousted and replaced by Dorjee Khandu, a Minister in the Apang cabinet.



Dorjee, 52, was sworn in as Chief Minister after Apang proposed his name at the Congress Legislature Party meeting in Itanagar on April 9.



Not that the wily veteran, who reigned for 30 months, had a choice. The writing was on the wall when Takam Sanjay, Political Adviser to Apang, resigned a day earlier and declared to all and sundry that the ousted Chief Minister was not heeding his advice to quit “gracefully”.



The meeting that finally sealed Apang’s fate got under way at 1 p.m. under the supervision of Union Labour Minister Oscar Fernandez, who is the AICC’s Northeast in-charge, and Information and Broadcasting Minister Priya Ranjan Das Munshi.



Das Munshi broke the news about the change of guard to the media. “Khandu has been unanimously selected as the Chief Minister of the state. Apang himself has proposed Khandu’s name as the next Chief Minister to pave the way for smooth functioning of the party,” he said.



Khandu had done his homework well. He even sent a group of 20-odd Congress legislators, including Ministers, to a luxury resort near Gurgaon in Haryana to ensure that Apang did not get a chance to win back their support. An aide of the ousted Chief Minister said he still had backers, but none stood up for him on his D-day.



There are 33 Congress legislators in the 60-member Assembly. The Nationalist Congress Party and the Arunachal Congress have two each and the BJP has nine. Independents comprise the second largest group with a strength of 14.



In his first interaction with the media after the swearing-in ceremony, Khandu said his priorities were to streamline the public distribution system, ensure time-bound implementation of power projects and initiate steps for autonomy to the four districts of Tirap, Changlang, Tawang and West Kameng under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution.



Apang, who attended the swearing-in, said he “honoured” Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s advice “to step down in the greater interest of the party”.







Arunachal Pradesh has a history of political turbulence and Apang has almost always been at the centre of it all. He has been Chief Minister for the maximum period since Arunachal Pradesh attained statehood.



As for Khandu, it has been a slow but steady climb to the top. He was the Power Minister under Apang and Mines and Minerals Minister in the erstwhile Mukut Mithi government.



Khandu has been contesting elections on a Congress ticket from Mukto, in Tawang district, since 1990 and won uncontested in 1990 and 2004.



The Council of Ministers will be reconstituted later this week. “Today only the new CM was sworn. There has to be some more discussions on the contours of the new ministry,” a source said.





What actually led to Apang’s ouster ?



On the face of it, it was infighting in the ruling Congress that saw Apang’s head rolling. But, according to north-east watchers, Apang’s ouster from office has opened a can of worms. It has become clear that it was not merely the rebellion within the Congress that sealed his fate, but larger security issues were responsible for his exit.



Dorjee Khandu, who came to power after revolting against Apang’s leadership, was not the only trigger for the change of guard. The Centre had taken serious note of allegations against Apang that he was ignoring the state’s security. The seriousness of the accusations, first conveyed to Governor S.K. Singh and subsequently to the Centre, meant that Apang could not continue in the hot seat.



One of the charges against Apang was that he had links with the Chinese and had even met officials of that country during his visit to the border. These appear to have worried the government.



Again, the fact that Apang did not utter a word after Chinese Ambassador San Yuxi said that Arunachal Pradesh belonged to China peeved fellow legislators.



While the campaign to dislodge Apang was under way, the Centre became increasingly worried about the need to put in place a Chief Minister against whom there could be no accusations that he was jeopardising security in Arunachal Pradesh.



This became all the more important when allegations propped up regarding Apang’s alleged links with the ULFA and the NSCN (I-M).



The Naga outfit has a strong presence in Tirap and Changlang districts while ULFA leaders were killed in Arunachal Pradesh in encounters recently.



Moreover, accusations that he amassed crores of rupees during his 24-year tenure as Chief Minister added to the dissidents’ firepower against Apang.







Army strikes at ULFA haven in Arunachal Pradesh : Eight killed



That Arunachal Pradesh had become a haven for north-east insurgents, particularly ULFA and Naga insurgents, was clear when security forces on April 10 gunned down eight ULFA rebels, two of them women, in what the Army claimed as the most successful “single strike” in a decade of counter-insurgency operations against the banned militant group.



The encounter took place at Lathao in Lohit district of Arunachal Pradesh, which has of late become the favourite sanctuary of ULFA militants on the run. Lathao is about 25 km from Namsai town.



Col Pramit Saxena, commanding officer of the 7/11 Gorkha Rifles, said from the battalion headquarters at Kakopathar in Assam that soldiers found two Kalashnikov rifles, a 9mm pistol, a huge quantity of assorted ammunition and mobile phones on the slain militants.



“We started mobilising our columns on Thursday after receiving information about some ULFA members moving about in Tiklibam and Hilaguri Chapori. This area is the favoured transit route for ULFA militants wanting to enter or exit the dense Manabhum forest,” Col Saxena said.



The encounter that the Army had been preparing for since last week took place around 5 am. Soldiers from the 7/11 Gorkha Rifles had just begun a search operation at Hiljan, a tiny settlement across the Assam-Arunachal Pradesh border, when they were fired upon from a hut. “As soon as our men approached the hut, they were greeted by a volley of bullets. The militants hiding there also lobbed a grenade, but our soldiers killed two of them,” the commanding officer said.



The troops, led by Lt Pankaj Kumar, chased the remaining militants for about one-and-a-half km and another gunbattle began. Six of the militants fell to army bullets during the exchange of fire, which continued till 11 am. There was no casualty on the Army’s side.



The Army resumed operations against ULFA in the wake of attacks by the militant group on Hindi-speaking people in January. The focus of operations has since shifted from Upper Assam Assam-Arunachal Pradesh border.



The militant group has lost 16 members, including its “Alpha Company” chief Himeswar Borsaikia, since March 31. Alpha Company is a unit of the outfit’s dreaded 28 Battalion.





Only political dialogue can solve the problem : ULFA chairman



The ULFA in a statement on Wednesday, April 11, said there could not be a military solution to the conflict. “Only a political dialogue can resolve the problem,” ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa said.

However, the ULFA last month had rejected the Assam government’s offer for unconditional talks and warned of stepped up violence, including using human bombs to attack selected targets.



Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi had offered unconditional peace talks with the ULFA, aimed at ending close to three decades of insurgency in the region.



The ULFA said direct talks could be possible only if New Delhi agreed to discuss its core demand of sovereignty or independence, and release five of its jailed leaders.