Shillong, August 17: “Regionally integrated development approaches with the backing of digital connectivity can help India’s North Eastern states and it eastern neighbours to revolutionise the economic scenario in this sub-region”, said Conrad Sangma, Chief Minister, Meghalaya. Sangma was speaking at the Shillong Dialogue being organized by the Asian Confluence in collaboration with The Asia Foundation.
The two day consultative Dialogue is being organized by Asian Confluence to deliberate on shared opportunities, challenges and the geo-spaces of possibilities and come up with concrete ideas to root the larger vision of regional connectivity and prosperity at the ground level in the sub-region, comprising of the seven North Eastern states of India and the eastern neighbours of Bangladesh, Bhutan, Myanmar and Nepal.
The dialogue started off with Mr. Sabyasachi Dutta, Executive Director of Asian Confluence, setting the larger context through a visual presentation of maps of the region, to highlight the once connected region, the fractions in between and the recent thrust towards reconnecting the entire region through a slew of projects on physical connectivity.
Mr. Surendra Pandey, Member of Parliament, Nepal, shared that economic rationale needs to overcome the political barriers in our region to be able to ride the tide of development. Prof. Shakti Sinha, Director, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library and eminent thought leader in his Keynote address opined that the time has come when the entities in the region need to realise the imperative to come together as a larger and integrated economic entity.
The first day saw interesting deliberations by experts from all the five countries on the three pillars that the Asian Confluence work is focusing on, viz. tourism, regional agri-horti value chains and regional trade-transit-tourism hubs.
Experts opined that it is crucial to talk about not only the opportunities but also the issues and the discordant notes that face the region. It is only then that concrete and realistic ideas can emerge from the discussions which can then go on to be implemented. The dialogue has participation from government, diplomatic corps, private sector, academia, civil society organizations and media from all five countries
