Bhubaneswar: Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has urged Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to convene an all-party meeting for quick resolution of border issues with neighbouring Andhra Pradesh.
Though the Kotia cluster comprising 28 villages is presently located within Odisha, 21 villages have found a place in the newly carved Parvatipuram-Manyam district of the neighbouring state. The district headquarters is just 40 km from some villages of the cluster in Odisha.
Both Odisha and Andhra Pradesh governments are engaged in a five-decade-long political tug-of-war over the ownership of 21 out of the 28 villages in the Kotia panchayat and the case is sub-judice at the Supreme Court since 1968.
In a letter to Patnaik written on October 31 and released to the press on Friday, Pradhan, who hails from Odisha, said the chief minister should also review the progress made by the inter-state committee and highlight the developmental activities taken up in the border villages.
Referring to his earlier letters to the chief minister in 2020 and 2021, the senior BJP leader once again sought the chief minister’s intervention in addressing emerging issues in the border villages in south Odisha, namely the Kotia group of villages in Pottangi block of Koraput district and Manikapatna in Rayagada block of Gajapati district.
Noting that in the past few days, administrative outreach has been reported in these villages by the Andhra Pradesh government Pradhan said: “This illegitimate and unfortunate outreach by Andhra Pradesh Government is now not only confined to Kotia but is also gradually spreading to other villages in south Odisha.”
Andhra Pradesh has been proactively implementing several schemes and developmental activities in these villages for luring the residents to be a part of Andhra Pradesh, he claimed in the letter.
“It requires the Odisha government to be proactive on the ground, thereby bringing the government and administration closer to the residents of these border villages. Being far away from the district headquarter, people may find the Andhra Pradesh administration more accessible,” Pradhan said.
He also expressed apprehension that the neighbouring state may also alienate the citizens of Kotia region from Odisha, and thereby sever their age-old “socio-cultural umbilical cord with their motherland.”
Andhra Pradesh is trying to “sway” these border villagers by offering ration cards, healthcare, education, and other facilities, the union minister claimed.
Keeping this in mind, Odisha should take the local population and organisations into confidence and address developmental issues by ensuring people staying in bordering villages are not lured by the facilities offered by the Andhra Pradesh government.
The Odisha government should also expedite the implementation of developmental activities in the state, he said
He also cautioned the state government that such administrative face-offs and disputes will not only create disharmony among the people of the border areas but also hinder the development of these villages.
“It will derail the ongoing development process which goes against the socio-political objectives of both states, and sow seeds for anti-establishment sentiments to take root in this region,” the union minister said.
PTI