On Assam-Meghalaya Border Pact SC to Hear Plea in July

India’s Supreme Court said it will hear the Meghalaya government’s plea challenging the High Court order that upheld the MoU signed between Meghalaya and Assam to resolve the long-standing inter-state border dispute. Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was put on hold. The month of July.
A bench of Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud and Justices PS Narasimha and JB Pardiwala said the application was wrongly filed by the registry today and will hear it in July.
The Meghalaya High Court had on December 8, 2022, granted an interim stay on the implementation of the Assam-Meghalaya border agreement, which was reached between the two states after the signing of the MoU on March 29, 2022. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma signed to resolve the long-standing inter-state border dispute, particularly in respect of the six territories.
The Meghalaya government has approached the Supreme Court against the High Court’s order, saying that matters relating to boundary changes or exchange of territories between the two states are purely political questions within the “sole domain” of the executive.
Assam was ordered to retain 18.51 sq km of land under the arrangement, while Meghalaya retained 18.28 sq km of land, for a total of 36.79 sq km.

Meghalaya was separated from Assam as a separate state in 1972, but the new state challenged the Assam Reorganization Act of 1971, resulting in disputes over 12 border points.
It may be noted that in March 2022, the two states signed a historic agreement in Delhi to resolve their 50-year-old pending border dispute in the presence of Union Home Minister Amit Shah at the Home Ministry office.