Chief Minister of Meghalaya, Conrad K Sangma has said that the state government is not abandoning the border talks with Assam over the remaining six areas of difference shared between the two states.

Sangma said, “We have not abandoned (the border talks) but there are lots of issues and concerns going on and a lot of homework has to be done again further in this entire thing as for 50 years in fact no initiative was taken so finally the MDA government has taken the initiative.”

The Meghalaya CM was responding to a query as to when the two states will start the second phase of border talks after an MoU was signed to resolve disputes over six areas in the presence of Union home minister Amit Shah in Delhi on March 29.

He said that the government was equally concerned about the issue and a lot of work behind the scenes is underway.

Sangma said, “We have started doing our homework as it requires a lot of work to be done, lots of documentations, mapping, we cannot just look at the old maps because we realize in the last report that was submitted in 2011 as there were lots of concerns and there were maps that were really some areas were not very clear so it requires a lot of drone mapping all these areas. So lots of preparation is going on and it is not very simple.”

“For meeting's sake we can always meet. It is not a problem at all but before we meet it is important we do our planning properly and we do our homework properly and prepare the documents – that is what we are doing from our side,” he added.