Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Thursday shared a glimpse of an early-morning jog through the forested trails of Shillong, the capital of neighbouring Meghalaya, in a short video posted on X. The BJP leader described the wooded path as 'the best running track', framing nature itself as the ideal fitness companion.

'Jogging through the forests of Shillong - the best running track is nature's own trail,' the Chief Minister wrote, accompanying the post with footage of the green canopy and undulating terrain that characterise the Khasi Hills capital.

Context

Pema Khandu, who has helmed Arunachal Pradesh since 2016, frequently uses his social media handles to showcase the lifestyle and landscapes of the Northeast. The Shillong post fits a familiar pattern of personal, location-tagged updates that highlight outdoor activity in the region's hill stations.

Shillong, often called the 'Scotland of the East', sits at an altitude of nearly 1,500 metres and is ringed by pine forests, waterfalls and walking trails that draw fitness enthusiasts and tourists through the year.

Policy backdrop

The post lands amid a sustained push by the Centre and Northeast state governments to position the eight-state region as an eco-tourism and wellness destination. Initiatives such as the Act East policy and dedicated Ministry of DoNER programmes have funnelled investment into trail development, homestays and adventure tourism circuits across Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Sikkim.

Chief ministers from the region have, in recent years, leaned on personal social media to amplify these campaigns, treating their own travel and outdoor routines as informal endorsements of local landscapes. The Meghalaya government, in particular, has marketed Shillong and the nearby Sohra (Cherrapunji) belt as flagship destinations for nature-based tourism.

Stakeholders and impact

For eco-tourists, trekking operators and homestay owners in Shillong, visibility from a sitting Chief Minister of a neighbouring state carries soft-power weight. Such posts typically trigger upticks in social-media engagement around the location and reinforce the Northeast's image as a clean-air, low-density alternative to crowded metro fitness circuits.

The video also dovetails with broader public-health messaging around outdoor activity and lifestyle disease prevention, themes that both the Centre and state governments have promoted through campaigns linking fitness with national productivity.

What's next

Tourism departments across the Northeast are expected to roll out fresh summer-season campaigns, and joint inter-state eco-tourism events have been mooted in recent policy conversations. Posts like Khandu's are likely to feed into that messaging ecosystem, even when they carry no formal policy announcement.

For now, the Chief Minister's brief dispatch from a Shillong trail is a reminder that the Northeast's most marketable asset remains, quite literally, the ground beneath the runner's feet.