Look (Act) East Policy and Northeast India: Reimagining the Space Through Institutional, Physical and Social Connectivity

Abstract

The underdevelopment of Northeast India is quite often explained in terms of economic isolation primarily on account of its geographical peripherality. To address this challenge, a new imagination, through the Look (Act) East Policy has been proposed. This approach, makes India’s Northeast the centre of a unified economic, physical and social space through its integration with the trans-border neighbouring regions. In this article, an attempt has been made to examine the logic of developing an ‘extended Northeast’ and how it has been sought to be realized. The article argues that the actualization of this proposed integrated space is ridden with serious difficulties and the internal fragmentation of Northeast India and the exceptional rules and administrative arrangement that are in place in the region along with the geopolitical compulsion of India may act as significant barriers in this regard. And most importantly there are apprehensions that the proposed integrated space may lead to the appropriation of resources of the Northeast by the corporate houses without benefiting the people of the region.