The Gorkha Janmukti Morcha’s renewed demand to include 396 mouzas from the Dooars and Terai in a proposed constitutional body has reopened one of north Bengal’s most difficult governance questions: how should political representation and territorial administration be designed in a region where identity, geography and population do not align neatly?
The demand was raised by Morcha general secretary Roshan Giri at the party’s 20th foundation day celebration in Darjeeling. Giri said the party had submitted a list of the 396 mouzas to the West Bengal government and argued that the areas should be included in the proposed arrangement for the Gorkhas, Adivasis and Rajbanshis. The claim places the state government at the centre of the immediate decision-making process, while also reviving the role of the Union government in a proposed constitutional settlement.
The issue is not simply about adding villages or administrative units to an existing hill arrangement. It concerns the geographical boundary of political authority in a region where the Darjeeling and Kalimpong hills have historically been treated differently from the plains. Existing institutions such as the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council and the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration cover the hill regions, while the Dooars and Terai remain outside those territorial structures. Including parts of the plains would therefore alter the scope of any future body and create questions about its jurisdiction, composition and relationship with state administration.
That distinction matters because the social composition of the plains is different from that of the hills. The source report describes the hill regions as predominantly Gorkha in population, while the Dooars and Terai have mixed populations. A boundary that is politically meaningful to one community may therefore have different implications for residents belonging to other communities. The question is not only whether 396 mouzas can be placed within a new administrative framework, but also how representation, public services and local accountability would work in areas with varied social and political identities.
The present demand follows a long institutional history. After the Trinamool Congress came to power in 2011, the agreement establishing the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration included a committee to examine the Morcha’s demand for the inclusion of 396 mouzas from the Terai and Dooars. A committee headed by retired Justice Shyamal Sen subsequently recommended the inclusion of only five of the 396 mouzas in the GTA. The gap between the original demand and that recommendation has remained a central point of contention.
This history shows why the latest statement is more than a fresh political appeal. The number of 396 mouzas is tied to an earlier negotiated process, but the proposed institutional destination has changed. The Morcha is now linking the demand to a constitutional body that, according to Giri, would cover Gorkhas, Adivasis and Rajbanshis after an interlocutor-led committee submits its report. The administrative question has therefore moved from the boundaries of the GTA to the design of a larger political settlement.
Giri identified the state government as responsible for the territorial component of the demand. He said the list of mouzas had already been submitted to the state and appealed to the chief minister to include them in the proposed arrangement. He also compared the demand with the creation of the Bodoland Territorial Council in Assam, arguing that the Morcha was asking for mouzas rather than entire districts. That comparison is part of the party’s argument for treating the demand as a limited territorial adjustment rather than a wholesale restructuring of the plains.
The comparison, however, does not resolve the underlying administrative issues. A mouza is a revenue and land-administration unit, but grouping hundreds of such units into a new political structure would still require decisions about powers, finances, service delivery and coordination with existing local bodies. The supplied material does not establish what powers the proposed constitutional body would receive, how it would be funded or how its authority would interact with the state government and other local institutions. Those unanswered questions are central to whether the arrangement would reduce conflict or create a new layer of jurisdiction.
The proposed body is also linked to a broader political promise. The Bharatiya Janata Party had promised a permanent political solution for the people of Darjeeling, the Dooars and the Terai in its 2019 Lok Sabha election manifesto. The latest demand places that promise under renewed pressure because the territorial scope of any solution remains contested. The Morcha has supported the BJP in Lok Sabha elections since 2009, but its current position requires the party-led Union government and the West Bengal government to address a demand that affects both state authority and regional representation.
The institutional chain described by the Morcha remains incomplete. Giri said that a committee headed by Pankaj Kumar Singh, a former deputy national security adviser and retired IPS officer, had been formed and that the Centre would grant a constitutional body after the committee submitted its report. The source material does not provide the committee’s terms of reference, reporting deadline, proposed constitutional mechanism or the status of consultations with residents and other political organisations in the Dooars and Terai. Without those details, the political announcement establishes the demand but not the architecture of the eventual arrangement.
The cancelled visit of the chief minister added a political dimension to the event. The chief minister had been scheduled to attend the Darjeeling celebration but cancelled the visit after attending an event marking Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 25 years in administration, according to the report. Giri used the absence to reiterate his appeal directly, while the Morcha’s public position made clear that it expected the state government to respond to the territorial component of the proposal.
The party’s attempt to distinguish its current approach from the agitation of 2017 is also significant. Morcha president Bimal Gurung said he was no longer the Bimal Gurung of 2017 and that he wanted peace in the region. Gurung and Giri had gone underground following the Gorkhaland agitation in 2017, and Gurung resurfaced in 2020. He briefly supported the Trinamool Congress during the 2021 Bengal Assembly elections and is currently an ally of the BJP, according to the report.
That political repositioning does not remove the structural difficulty. The 2017 agitation demonstrated how quickly a territorial demand can become a question of public order, governance and economic disruption. The current emphasis on peace may indicate a preference for negotiation, but the source material does not establish whether the competing political and community interests have narrowed. It only shows that the Morcha is presenting the demand through an institutional and constitutional framework rather than through the form of agitation associated with the earlier movement.
The 396-mouza issue therefore sits at the intersection of three administrative problems. The first is territorial: which areas should fall within a special regional arrangement? The second is representative: how should a body serve populations with different ethnic, political and local identities? The third is institutional: what powers should such a body exercise in relation to the state, the GTA and other local authorities? The available information confirms the demand and its historical background, but not the answers to any of these questions.
For residents, the practical significance will ultimately depend on whether a new structure changes how decisions are made and services are delivered. A boundary announcement by itself would not clarify responsibility for roads, land administration, local infrastructure, welfare delivery or development planning. Those responsibilities would need to be defined if the proposed body is to function as more than a political symbol. The source report does not provide a service-delivery framework, budget, implementation schedule or consultation process.
The next stage is consequently institutional rather than rhetorical. The interlocutor-led committee is expected to submit a report, after which the Centre is expected to consider a constitutional body. The state government’s position on the 396 mouzas, the committee’s recommendations and the response of residents and organisations in the Dooars and Terai will determine whether the latest demand becomes part of a negotiated settlement or remains another unresolved boundary proposal.
What the latest development confirms is that the territorial question has not disappeared with the creation of the GTA or with changes in political alliances. It has moved into a new phase in which the proposed constitutional body, rather than the GTA alone, is being asked to accommodate the plains. What remains uncertain is the body’s design, the status of the 396 mouzas and the balance between regional autonomy and state-wide administrative authority. Those are the issues that will define the next stage of north Bengal’s governance debate.
