Day: December 15, 2012

Mail News Service
Imphal, Dec 15: Participants of ASEAN car rally 2012 were warmly welcomed at Moreh, border town of Manipur today. Govindas Konthoujam, Minister , Meghachandra, Parliamentary Secretary welcomed the participants and proceeded towards Imphal.
The participating teams arrived in the Imphal city at around 1:10 pm when a huge enthusiastic crowd including school and
college students received them amidst greetings.
Chief Minister O Ibobi received them at Kangla Fort where a cultural programme was organized by the state Government to entertain the participating teams from 11 countries. He also encouraged them by giving mementos at the function. Manipur
Deputy Chief Minister Gaikhangam also attended the function.
Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Minister said, “I am informed that 2012 is the 20th Anniversary of ASEAN-India Summit-level partnership and I also understand that the Government of India is hosting the ASEAN-India Commemorative Summit in New Delhi from December 20-21. The theme of the summit is “ASEAN-India Partnership for Peace and Shared Prosperity.”
The summit is expected to adopt the “ASEAN-India Vision Statement 2020’ which would chart the future direction of
ASEAN-India relations and that the statement will also include recommendations by the ASEAN-India Eminent Persons Group (AIEPG), the Chief Minister added.
“Enhancing relations with ASEAN has been central to India’s “Look East Policy” and we are happy to note that there has been steady progress in the ASEAN-India relations since the policy was initiated in 1991,” he said.
India became a sectorial dialogue partner of ASEAN in 1992, which was upgraded to full dialogue partnership in 1996. Since
2002, India-ASEAN Summits have been held annually.
The Chief Minister later sent off them around 3:20 pm from Kangla Fort.
The ASEAN-India Car Rally was flagged off on November 26 from Yogyakarta , Indonesia with a wonderful cultural performances from Manipuri and Indonesia dancers. The rally thereafter proceeded to the iconic Borobudur temple, the largest Buddhist temple in the world and proceeded to to Singapore for the second leg of the ASEAN India car rally.
The ASEAN-India Car Rally was jointly organized by the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and all ASEAN nations, the ASEAN India car rally commemorates 20 years of ASEAN-India relationship in the run up to the India-ASEAN commemorative Summit to be held in New Delhi on 20-21 December 2012.
The ASEAN-India Car Rally was flagged off at 0900 hrs on 26th November 2012 in a grand ceremony held at Royal Ambarrukmo
Hotel. From the Indian side, Mr. P.S. Raghavan, Special Representative of the External Affairs Minister, Mr. Gurjit Singh
Ambassador of India to Indonesia and ASEAN and Mr. Adi Godrej, President of Confederation of Indian Industries (CII)
flagged off the rally cars while the Indonesian side was represented by Mr. Gusti Agung Wesaka Puja, Director General of
ASEAN, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Representative of the Governor of Yogyakarta and other dignitaries.
Hundreds of people had gathered at the venue, including school children waving flags of India, Indonesia and other ASEAN countries, to witness the event and cheer the rally participants.
The ASEAN national anthem was sung on the occasion followed by cultural performances from India and Indonesia. A Manipuri dance troupe from Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), India, performed on the occasion.
In his remarks at the Flag off, Mr. P.S. Raghavan, Special Representative of the External Affairs Minister, said that the ASEAN-India Car Rally, during its journey through ASEAN countries and India, would highlight the richness of culture and heritage in each of the countries, the complementarity of our engines of growth, the increasing bilateral trade accrossour border and the people-to-people bridges that have existed in this regions for several millenia.

Read more / Original news source: http://manipur-mail.com/asean-car-rally-reaches-moreh-leave-for-nagaland/