Union Minister for Communications and Development of North-Eastern Region (DoNER), Jyotiraditya M. Scindia today participated in the meeting of the North-Eastern Space Applications Centre (NESAC) Society in Shillong.
The meeting was also attended by Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma, Minister of State for DoNER Sukanta Majumdar, Vice-Chairman of the NESAC Society and Secretary, Department of Space & Chairman, ISRO, Dr. V. Narayanan, along with senior officials from the Centre and the Northeastern States.
Addressing the meeting, Scindia outlined five strategic initiatives to position NESAC as a transformative institution for regional development, disaster preparedness, climate-smart governance, scientific innovation and data-driven policymaking.
These include high-resolution village resource mapping; regular monitoring of wetlands, forests, rivers and landscapes; promotion of geospatial and space-technology startups in the Northeast; development of an all-hazard disaster resilience digital twin platform, NER-Shield; and creation of a Northeast Green Wealth and Natural Capital Accounting framework.
The meeting reviewed the progress of NESAC projects and deliberated on the future roadmap for leveraging space technology, satellite applications and geospatial intelligence to accelerate development across the Northeastern Region.
The deliberations reflected Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of technology-led development and carried forward the future-ready strategy for the Northeast articulated by Union Home Minister and President of the NESAC Society, Amit Shah.
Since the 12th NESAC Meeting in Tripura, 50 projects have been completed while 78 projects are under implementation across sectors including agriculture, disaster management, weather services, communications, natural resource mapping, infrastructure planning and rural development.
Several key initiatives undertaken by NESAC were reviewed, including cropping system analysis to improve agricultural productivity, bamboo and Agarwood resource mapping in Assam and Meghalaya, weather and climate services, satellite-based communication support, and outreach programmes such as NE-SPARKS, through which 786 students from the Northeastern States visited ISRO facilities.
The meeting also reviewed the Vision NESAC roadmap, which envisages a phased transformation of the region through space-enabled governance and innovation, progressing from Smart Analytics to a Smart Region and ultimately to an Autonomous Ecosystem.
Highlighting the longstanding partnership between DoNER and NESAC, Scindia said: "NESAC and DoNER have shared an umbilical relationship since their inception. Conceived under the visionary leadership of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, both institutions have served the eight Northeastern States continuously for over 26 years as instruments of development and transformation."
He noted that the completion of 50 projects since the previous Society Meeting represents the creation of a valuable digital knowledge base supporting the development aspirations of over 4.5 crore people in the region. The Minister also highlighted the economic potential of agarwood cultivation and value-chain development, noting that geospatial mapping and traceability systems can unlock new opportunities for farmers and entrepreneurs in the Northeast.
To strengthen disaster resilience, Scindia called for hyper-local, multilingual last-mile alert systems integrated with telecom networks and recommended expanding geospatial risk-monitoring tools for landslides and other natural hazards.
In agriculture, he advocated the use of farmer-friendly precision agriculture platforms and geospatial registries for high-value and GI-tagged products, including agarwood, to improve productivity, traceability and market access. For infrastructure development, he emphasised the use of geospatial decision-support systems for project planning, hazard assessment and connectivity enhancement.
He also highlighted the potential of drone technologies and suggested leveraging NESAC's UAV capabilities to create livelihood and skill-development opportunities for youth and women, including through convergence with the Namo Drone Didi initiative.
Referring to the contribution of ISRO in strengthening NESAC's capabilities, Scindia said: "The participation of ISRO has provided new propulsion to NESAC's efforts. Missions such as Chandrayaan-3 and Aditya-L1 demonstrate India's technological excellence and our ability to achieve extraordinary outcomes with remarkable efficiency."
Concluding his remarks, the Minister said: "As envisaged by Home Minister Amit Shah, we must adopt a future-ready strategy that harnesses space technology, geospatial intelligence, communications infrastructure and innovation to transform governance, strengthen resilience and improve the quality of life across the Northeast."
The meeting concluded with a reaffirmation of the commitment of NESAC, ISRO, DoNER and the Northeastern States to leverage space technology and innovation as key enablers of inclusive, sustainable and future-ready development across the region.