Shillong, June 10: Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Thursday said that the state government is not abandoning the border talks with Assam for resolving the remaining six areas of difference shared between the two states.

“We have not abandoned (the border talks) but there are lots of issues and concerns going on and a lot of homework has to be done again further in this entire thing as for 50 years in fact no initiative was taken so finally the MDA government has taken the initiative,” Sangma told reporters.

He was responding to a query as to when the two states will commence the second phase of border talks after signing the MoU for resolving the six areas of difference in presence of Union Home Minister Amit Shah in New Delhi on March 29.

Stating that the government is equally concerned about the issue, Sangma said, “We have started doing our homework as it requires a lot of work to be done, lots of documentations, mapping. We cannot just look at the old maps because we realized, in the last report that was submitted in 2011, there were lots of concerns and there were maps that… some areas were not very clear… so it requires a lot of drone mapping all these areas. So, lots of preparation is going on and it is not very simple.”

“For meeting’s sake we can always meet. It is not a problem at all but before we meet it is important we do our planning properly and we do our homework properly and prepare the documents – that is what we are doing from our side,” he added.