New Delhi: Retired IPS officer Ajit Lal, a 1974-batch Himachal Pradesh cadre officer, will take over because the Ministry of Residence Affairs’ Northeast adviser, changing A.Ok. Mishra whose time period ended final week, two senior authorities officers advised ThePrint.

Mishra, a 1987-batch Rajasthan IPS cadre officer, was concerned in tripartite talks with Kuki-Zo rebel teams that had signed the Suspension of Operations (SoO) settlement with the Centre–in addition to the Naga peace talks. Lal will now assume these obligations.

Manipur has been reeling below the impression of the 2023 ethnic battle between the non-tribal Meiteis and tribal Kuki-Zo communities. Final week, the Centre put in a preferred authorities within the state, with a Meitei chief minister, and Kuki and Naga deputy chief ministers to finish a 12 months of political vacuum.

Although the Centre is but to make an official announcement on the appointment, one of many officers stated Tuesday that Mishra knowledgeable members at a 4 February assembly in Delhi — which included Kuki-Zo teams and senior Manipur authorities officers — that his time period had ended and Lal would exchange him.

Lal isn’t any stranger to the Northeast. He was briefly concerned within the Naga peace talks for 5 months in 2014, after the then interlocutor R.S. Pandey resigned to affix the BJP and contest the Lok Sabha election from Bihar.

However, shortly after the Narendra Modi-led Nationwide Democratic Alliance authorities got here to energy, the Residence Ministry changed him and appointed present Tamil Nadu Governor R.N. Ravi as the brand new interlocutor.

An skilled safety hand, Lal retired as chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee on the Nationwide Safety Council Secretariat on 31 July 2014. Earlier than that, he served as particular director within the Intelligence Bureau, dealing with a number of the main insurgency-affected areas.

A graduate of Delhi’s St Stephen’s Faculty, Lal additionally served as counsellor on the Indian embassy in Washington DC, the place he dealt with safety of the embassy and its personnel.

(Edited by Prerna Madan)