GUWAHATI: United People’s Party Liberal (UPPL) president Pramod Boro assumed the office of the chief executive member (CEM) of the fourth Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC), an autonomous body which was constituted under the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution of India in the year 2003. After the oath-taking ceremony at the Green Field Ground in Bodofa Nwgar, Boro reached the BTC secretariat and interacted with the staff.
Addressing the media persons, Pramod Boro promised that all the pending works would be completed soon.
“A free, fair and transparent administration should be here within 6 months,” he said.
“We will work as a team to serve the people of the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR),” he added.
Besides Pramod Boro, the others sworn in included Deputy CEM Gobinda Chandra Basumatry of the United Peoples’ Party Liberal (UPPL), BJP’s Gautam Das and Diganta Barua and Gana Suraksha Party’s (GSP) Ghanashyam Das.
Boro took oath in Bodo language while the others did it in Assamese.
Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, Irrigation Minister Bhabesh Kalita, Lok Sabha MPs Dilip Saikia, who is also the BJP’s National General Secretary, and Pallab Lochan Das, Rajya Sabha MPs- Bhubaneswar Kalita and U G Brahma- were present in the swearing in ceremony.
The outgoing CEM Hagrama Mohilary of Bodo Peoples’ Front (BPF) was conspicuous by his absence on the occasion.
Pramod Boro, after taking oath, thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, the Chief Minister and Finance Minister for paving the way for peace and development in the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) with the signing of a new Bodo Accord in January this year.
He described the Prime Minister as a visionary who had taken the initiative to solve the problems of the region so that peace can prevail.
Many governments have come and gone but no such definite initiative like bringing all factions of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) were taken before, he said.
He assured all communities living in the BTR to live without fear and to come forward with their problems which the new council will try to resolve in the next five years.
Boro, the former President of the All Bodo Students’ Union (ABSU) who went on to form the UPPL, said that his priority will be to ensure that there is no ‘unhappy people’ in the BTR after the five year rule of the new council.
The UPPL has won 12 seats, BJP nine and GSP one seat in the just concluded 40-member council polls while the Bodoland Peoples’ Front (BPF), which had headed the autonomous body for the last three terms, emerged as the single largest party with 17 seats and Congress secured one seat.
The lone Congress member Sajal Kumar Sinha joined the BJP on Monday and was subsequently expelled from the Congress.
The BJP on Sunday had decided to dump its alliance partner BPF in the state government and join hands with the UPPL and the GSP to form the next council in the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR), comprising the four districts of Kokrajhar, Chirang, Baksa and Udalguri.
The BTC elections had assumed significance in view of the state assembly elections likely to be held next year with all the 14 seats from the four districts currently held by the BPF.
The BPF had joined hands with the BJP before the 2016 assembly polls to form the government and three of its MLAs- Pramila Rani Brahma, Chandan Brahma and Rihon Daimary are currently ministers in the Sonowal cabinet.
The elections to the Council, earlier scheduled to be held on April 4 was deferred due to the Coronavirus pandemic, were held in two phases on December seven and 10.
With inputs from PTI
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