Northeast India

Northeast India, officially the North Eastern Region (NER), is the easternmost region of India representing both a geographic and political administrative division of the country. It comprises eight states: Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, and Tripura (commonly known as the "Seven Sisters"), and the "Brother" state of Sikkim. North-east India is one of the most linguistically diverse regions in the world.

The region has India's international border of 5,182 kilometres (3,220 mi) with five neighbouring countries: China to the north, Myanmar to the east, Bangladesh to the southwest, Nepal to the west, and Bhutan to the northwest. It comprises an area of 262,184 square kilometres (101,230 sq mi), almost 8 per cent of that of India and has a population of 45,772,188, almost 4 per cent that of India. The Siliguri Corridor connects the region to other parts of India.

Northeast is very rich in mineral wealth; India's first oil well was dug in Northeast India in 1865, in Digboi in Assam. The region houses one of the notable ophiolites in the world.

The region has been highly strategic and it witnessed one of the fiercest battles in the Second World War, the Battle of Imphal and Kohima (1944) where the Japanese Forces and the Allied Forces were engaged in a pitched battle that saw thousands of casualties on both sides.

The states of North Eastern Region are officially recognised under the North Eastern Council (NEC), constituted in 1971 as the acting agency for the development of the north eastern states.Sikkim became a member of the North Eastern Council in 2002. India's Look-East connectivity projects connect Northeast India to East Asia and ASEAN.