New Delhi, July 8: Replying to a request made by the Department for the Development of Northeastern Region (DoNER) ministry last year, the Delhi government has agreed to provide land for setting up a hostel exclusively for students from the Northeast in the capital.

The hostel, will be able to accommodate 1,000 students. It will be set-up with funds mainly from the non-lapsable pool of central resources that is under the DoNER?s administrative control.

According to an official release, Union minister of tribal affairs and DoNER, P. R. Kyndiah, in a meeting yesterday with Delhi chief minister Shiela Dikshit and minister for statistics and programme implementation Oscar Fernandez, said the Centre would provide the funds for procuring land for the hostel.

Dikshit assured Kyndiah that she would take up the matter with the Delhi Development Authority and Delhi University. She also promised to extend financial assistance to the project in collaboration with the northeastern state governments.

Currently, there are two hostels for Northeast students in Delhi but a certain percentage of the seats are reserved for other states.

Nearly 5,000 northeastern students land in Delhi every year for various courses. While some get admission, most of them have to do with rented rooms which can prove to be expensive.