Not ‘good speakers’, trust those who deliver, Tripura CM urges Janjatis

Agartala: Tripura Chief Minister Manik Saha on Tuesday urged the people of the state’s 19 tribal communities to trust leaders who deliver on their promises rather than those who merely “possess good public speaking skills.”

Dropping a clearer hint, he said, “I often see some people addressing the public through social media. Their public speaking skills, I must say, are exceptional and can easily influence others. But when it comes to delivering on their promises through constructive action, they are just a big zero.”

Those who have been following Tripura politics over the past few months need not make any wild guesses about whom the Chief Minister was referring to. In all likelihood, his veiled attack was aimed at Pradyot Kishore Debbarman, the founder of the Tipra Motha Party. Despite being in an alliance, the strains between the BJP and Tipra Motha are now very much in the public domain.

“It is the duty of the people to differentiate between performers and non-performers. For a long period, the innocent tribal population of the state had been treated merely as a vote bank. The British-introduced policy of divide and rule is still being applied to them. It must be admitted and accepted by all that this government is leaving no stone unturned for the development of the tribal areas,” Saha said at an event to distribute yarn among women tribal weavers at Rabindra Satabarshiki Bhavan. The yarn was distributed free of cost to promote indigenous handloom products.

It became even more evident that the Chief Minister was targeting Tipra Motha when he disclosed budget provisions for tribal areas.

Tipra Motha has consistently accused the state government of depriving the cash-strapped Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC), which has been governed by the party since 2021.

“Our last budget was Rs 32,000 crore. A lion’s share of the budget goes to committed expenditures such as salaries, pensions, and loan repayments, which no government can default on. The government has the liberty to spend around Rs 17,000 crore. Now, to clear all doubts, 40 percent of that amount is spent in tribal-dominated areas. Apart from that, most of the externally aided projects are focused on tribal regions. For instance, under TRESP and ELEMENT, Rs 1,400 crore and Rs 1,700 crore, respectively, are being spent in tribal areas,” the Chief Minister added.

He also said the state government had ordered a survey to identify the chieftains of sub-tribe communities to honour them with a monthly financial assistance of Rs 5,000 each. “We have 19 prominent tribes, but if we include the sub-tribes, the total number of distinct tribal groups will surpass 40. The DMs and SDMs have been instructed to profile them so that we can extend our scheme of honouring the chieftains with a monthly assistance of Rs 5,000 to them as well,” Saha said.

Later, when Saha was asked about Tipra Motha’s decision to become part of a larger Northeast-based political party, he refused to comment, saying, “All political parties have their own liberty to make decisions. They can do what they want to do.”