More autonomy for India's ethnic Gorkhas

The government of the Indian state of West Bengal plans to sign an agreement Monday offering greater autonomy to the Gorkha ethnic group in hopes of ending their often violent agitation for a homeland in the Himalayan foothills.

The agreement was negotiated by the newly elected government in West Bengal with the main Gorkha organization, Gorkha Janmukti Morcha, or Gorkha Peoples' Freedom Front.

However, it did not appear to go far enough for some activists who want a separate state carved out of West Bengal and have called a 48-hour strike in the area to protest the deal.

Gorkha nationalist leader Roshan Giri has said they have not abandoned the demand for a separate homeland but would wait for recommendations from a committee set up under the new accord.

India's Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram would be the third signatory to Monday's landmark accord to be initialed in the hill town of Sukna, about 300 miles (480 kilometers) north of Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal.

The agreement envisions a hill council with elected representatives, a committee that will determine what Gorkha-dominated areas will be represented and the transfer of land records to the newly created administrative authority.

In the 1980s, the Gorkhas led a violent insurgency leading to the deaths of some 1,200 people. They adopted more peaceful means in later decades. Experts say the agreement could bring development to the Darjeeling region famed for its tea gardens.

"Once peace returns, people will see the impact of the agreement," said Sanjoy Hazarika, head of the Center for North East Studies, a New Delhi-based think tank.

Darjeeling, a popular tourist and educational hub in India's northeast, had lost its sheen due to unrest fueled by frequent strikes by separatist groups.

"If calm prevails, tourists should return," he said.

India has 28 states and seven federally administered regions but there are growing demands for smaller states to be carved out of the larger ones.

Several parts of India — the Telengana region in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh, the Bundelkhand region in the central state of Madhya Pradesh and Vidarbha in the western state of Maharashtra — also face similar movements for new states. So far there have been no moves by the government to create separate states there.

India's Gorkha community is from the same ethnic group as the Gurkhas in Nepal, best known for the regiments in the Indian and British armies.