Union Minister of Communications and Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), Shri Jyotiraditya M. Scindia, participated in two High-Level Task Force (HLTF) meetings on 19 November 2025, as part of the Government’s strategy to drive coordinated, participatory and impactful development across the North Eastern Region (NER). Earlier this year, the Ministry of DoNER constituted eight HLTFs each led by a Chief Minister of a North Eastern State, following the consensus of the 72nd NEC Plenary Session held in Agartala.

The meeting of HLTF on Sports, chaired by the Governor of Manipur, Shri. Ajay Kumar Bhalla, saw participation from Union Minister of State for Sports & Youth Affairs, Smt. Raksha Khadse; Sports Minister of Mizoram, Shri. Lalnghinglova Hmar; Sports Minister of Meghalaya, Shri. Shakliar Warjri ;  Secretary, Ministry of DoNER and senior officials from the Government of Assam and the Sports Authority of India (SAI).

The meeting reinforced the “One Sport, One State” approach, with each participating State selecting a core discipline for comprehensive, end-to-end development. Building on this framework, Minister Scindia urged the participating States to prepare focused micro-proposals aligned with their chosen disciplines—Mizoram (Football), Manipur (Boxing & Weightlifting), Tripura (Judo), Meghalaya (Archery), Nagaland (Archery & Taekwondo), and Sikkim (Taekwondo). He underscored that these proposals must be developed jointly by State Sports Ministers and Secretaries, working closely with MoS Sports, Smt.  Raksha Khadse and SAI DG to ensure alignment, ownership and sustainability.

Minister Scindia emphasised that the roadmap must leverage the region’s natural strengths by identifying cross-State commonalities such as Football, Weightlifting, Judo, Archery, and Taekwondo, and developing sport-specific strategies with clear ministerial accountability. The Minister highlighted that the proposal must adopt a “60–40 model” with 60% focus on human resource development, world-class coaching, talent scouting and technology-enabled training, and only 40% on physical infrastructure, noting that while infrastructure exists across the country, true sporting excellence requires advanced coaching ecosystems, athlete-centric methodologies and the integration of cutting-edge technology. Minister emphasised “From this strategy, we must develop a clear and focused proposal. There should be a 60–40 division, with 60 percent dedicated to the people who provide coaching and technology-supported guidance, and only 40 percent to infrastructure. While facilities exist across the country, the real priority is high-quality coaching and effective human intervention. This is essential because even as infrastructure expands, athletes often do not receive the advanced, standards-driven training they need to excel. The Ministry for Development of the North Eastern Region would be happy to provide its full support in advancing this vision.”The Minister also called for each state to prepare a comprehensive sports calendar built bottom-up from pre-school, school and university levels to block-level tournaments supplemented by inter-state exposure, competitions and exchange programmes. He urged the adoption of a whole-of-government and whole-of-country approach to nurture the disciplines identified by the Northeast states, with the vision that at least one sport from the region should emerge as a national case study in the coming years. Scindia added that the strategy must balance a macro view of the eight North Eastern states with a micro, deep-dive approach into one selected discipline per State to drive excellence from the grassroots to elite levels.