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NEW DELHI: The stellar performance of the Bharatiya Janata Party BJP ) in the recent state elections in Tripura, Nagaland and Meghalaya is a landmark for a party which had little traction in the region except in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. The party never had any significant connect with the masses and was seen as an outsider.What changed the situation? BJP president Amit Shah in his first press conference after the results credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'Act East' policy for the upsurge in fortunes.Modi's 'Act East' policy included a big push for road and railway infrastructure and various steps to boost the regional economy. While most of the infrastructural projects are at various stages of completion, Modi's northeast agenda created a rhetoric of inclusiveness that helped bring the masses closer to the BJP.Below are a few important initiatives by the Modi government that may have made the BJP acceptable to the northeast voters:Before a metre-gauge line started in 2008, Tripura didn't have any railway link with the rest of the country. The Modi government converted it into broad gauge. All over the region, the government has converted 900 km of tracks to broad gauge. It also launched a Rajdhani Express and the Tripura Sundari Express between Agartala and Delhi. In 2016, then railways minister Suresh Prabhu laid the foundation stone for the Rs 2,315 crore, 88-km Dhansiri-Kohima railway track, connecting Kohima to the national railway network. The government also began railway projects to connect Imphal, Aizawl and Shillong. It has introduced more than two dozen new trains in the region. It also signed a deal with Bangladesh to develop a rail link between Tripura and Chittagong which would speed up flow of products, especially grains, to the region.Modi has branded his policy to build infrastructure in northeast as "Transformation by Transportation". Lack of connectivity has been a major roadblock in the economic progress on the region. Modi's promise of connectivity resonates with the masses. More than 3,800 km of national highways with an investment of Rs. 32,000 crore have been sanctioned in the region in the past three years while nearly 1,200 km of roads have been constructed, according to the government. In a public announcement in December last year, Modi said the centre would invest another Rs. 60,000 crore under the Special Accelerated Road Development Programme in the northeast and Rs. 30,000 crore under the Bharatmala project over three years. Modi also dedicated to the nation a 271-km two-lane national highway connecting Tura in western Meghalaya to the state capital Shillong last year.The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has allocated Rs 3,400 crore for the upgradation of airports in the North East region. According to the government, projects worth Rs 934 crore have already been completed while the rest would be over in the next two or three years. The aviation projects in the northeast include re-carpeting of the runway at Silchar and Lilabari airport and an aviation manpower training institute; development of Rupsi airport; a new integrated airport and an engineering workshop at Agartala; expansion and revamp of existing terminal building and runway at Dimapur; installation of an instrument landing system (ILS) at the Shillong airport; and operationalisation and development of the Tura airport.Last year, Modi dedicated the 60-MW Tuirial hydropower power project, which made Mizoram the third power-surplus state in the northeast, to Sikkim and Tripura. The project is expected to produce 251 million units of electricity annually. Announced in 1998 by the then Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, it was the first major central government project to be successfully commissioned in Mizoram. Recently, the government decided to fully fund various Central projects being implemented in the northeast instead of the previous practice of sharing 90 per cent of the cost. The Modi government has also made the 1360-km long India-Myanmar-Thailand trilateral highway, which is to be completed in 2020, a centerpiece of its 'Act East' policy. Opening the northeast to the ASEAN countries, the highway will boost the regional economy.In Budget 2018-19, the government re-classified bamboo from tree to grass which would enable easier cultivation for commercial purposes. Bamboo is central to the rural economy of the northeast. Its classification as tree meant various restrictions on its produce, transport and sale.