Prof. Anoop Mahajan represents the University of California . The paper presented by him in the Prof. M. B. Emeneau Centenary International Conference on South-Asian Linguistics is titled "Minimalist Implications of Long Distance Agreement in Hindi". The main issue discussed in this paper is whether agreement between a predicate oblique auxiliary and an argument involves a spec-head configuration, a government relation or an Agree relation oblique operation, especially related to Hindi.

        His hypothesis is based on conclusive evidence favoring the Agree based approaches represented by Bhatt and Boeckx. He asserts that the movement based approach is better than Agree based approach with reference Hindi. Prof. Mahajan notes certain problems with Bhatt/Boeckx approaches to Hindi agreement.

        The data presented in the paper focuses on the predicate/auxiliary agreement and discusses short distance and long distance agreements. Implying that Hindi agreement provides no evidence for the existence of Agree relation in Universal Grammar, Prof. Mahajan quotes many examples from Hindi language and describes them in the background of Bhatt/Boeckx approaches.

        In conclusion, Prof. Anoop Mahajan's establishes that no evidence for the existence of the Agree relation in Universal Grammar is provided. It also proves that a movement mediated approach looks more adequate in this situation.

        In the discussion that followed the session, chaired by Prof. K. V. Subbarao, Prof. Tanmoy Bhattacharya initiated the discussion by enquiring about the scanning of top-down and derivational agreement and optionality of case assignment, to which Prof. Mahajan replied that these are optionality of selection which one has to have in grammar and it is not optionality of movement.