Ghising resigns as caretaker head of Gorkha council

Kolkata: Gorkha National Liberation Front leader Subhash Ghising resigned as the caretaker chairman of Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council on Monday after an agitation and a huge public outcry for his ouster from the autonomous body.

Rebel Gorkha activists had gone on a 13-day-long hunger strike under the banner of Janamukti Morcha in the last fortnight of February, demanding the immediate resignation of Ghising and the scrapping of the proposed tribal status for the people of the hills under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution.

A high-powered Parliamentary panel had then advised the Centre to review the proposed inclusion of the area under the Sixth Schedule.

Later, the West Bengal Government accepted the demands of the Gorkha activists in this regard.

The state government had assured the rebel movement that Ghising would be removed from the post of caretaker chairman. The Gorkha Janamukti Morcha had set a March 10 deadline for Ghising's resignation.

Accordingly, Ghising submitted his resignation to Darjeeling District Magistrate Rajesh Sharma in Siliguri.

After putting in his papers, Ghising reiterated his demand for a seperate state of Gorkhaland and an open dialogue with the Centre on the issue of the Sixth Schedule status to the hills.

The month-long Gorkha Janamukti Morcha-led agitation against the GNLF chief was trigerred by Ghising's move to ink a deal with the Centre to provide Sixth Schedule status to the hills instead of statehood.

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