SHILLONG: After the KSU, the Synjuk Ki Rangbah Shnong and the CSWO have also opposed the proposed draft of the Meghalaya Community Participation Bill, 2010.
“The proposal to enact the proposed Bill will act contrary to the existing age old traditional system of governance,” SKRS general secretary H Oflyne Dohling said in a letter submitted to the House Select Committee chairman Friday Lyngdoh recently.
Pointing out that Friday Lyngdoh was very much involved in the affairs of the Dorbar Shnong in the past, Dohling said the chairman would be well aware of the existence of the traditional grassroots governance.
“He would be agree that the Bill would usurp the powers of the traditional system of governance,” the SKRS general secretary said.
Dohling also referred to late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi who told in the Parliament on May 15 1989, when the Panchayati Raj Bill was introduced, that the north-eastern States like Mizoram, Meghalaya and Nagaland have traditional system which are akin to the Panchayati Raj and must be preserved.
He also said the provisions of Panchayati Raj systems are to be exempted from these areas.
The Synjuk would like to welcome any move by the Government to empower the Dorbar Shnong, Dohling added.
While opposing the proposed Bill, CSWO president Agnes Kharshiing, however, said the Government is trying to dilute and undermine the role of the traditional institutions, the Syiem, Lyngdoh, Sirdar, Nokma, the Dolloi, and the Rangbah Shnongs.
She also said the government should not try to bulldoze all unwarranted Bills against the will of the indigenous people of the State.
Kharshiing questioned as to why the indigenous people should lose their identity just “for the sake of 20-30 per cent development”.
Referring to the district councils’ power to make laws with respect to the establishment of village or town committees or councils, the CSWO president felt that no legislation should bypass the views of the recognised institutions and traditional bodies.
Earlier, the KSU had termed the proposed draft of the MCP Bill as anti-people.
