The Meghalaya jails seem to be terribly unguarded spaces. Imagine some militants having a free run of the land and gunning down jail officials with impunity. The situation in Garo Hills is spiralling out of control and police do not seem to have a clue on how to tackle the menace. Militancy in Garo Hills is no longer a political problem but a law and order one. And the reason why militants have gone amok is because they enjoy political patronage. Each group is in cahoots with some politician or the other so no one wants to take action. The police too prefer to look the other way. But is this how the law enforcers should be working? Are they not supposed to be completely apolitical and to serve the nation and its citizens? Sadly we see them subservient to political whims and fancies. Otherwise what prevents them from building up a water tight case against the militants when they are arrested? Arresting is only one part of policing. Evidence gathering and charge-sheeting are the next important steps. The police always falter at this crucial point. It does not speak too highly of them. The conviction rate in Meghalaya is one of the lowest in the country, so crime has only one way to go and that is up.
At this critical juncture when police are supposed to be most alert and to keep watch in case there are electoral transgressions, a higher up in the police establishment is accused of collecting money from contractors and government suppliers at the behest of politicians, to finance the elections. This is pure and simple corruption. When the law enforcers are themselves guilty of crime how can they catch other criminals? They become the laughing stock.
Some days ago an editorial in these columns lauded the East Khasi Hills Police for arresting the HNLC sympathisers who had allegedly fired at the Lumdiengjri Police Station as well as those who had unfurled the flag of the banned outfit on January 25th last year. This effort by the District Police is not necessarily a directive from above. The present SP, East Khasi Hills is well experienced in handling militancy and the credit goes to him and his team for nipping the problem in the bud. We do not want a resurgence of militancy in the Khasi Hills. The problem is with the Garo Hills and how the police higher ups view the problem. Do they have a policy on tackling militancy? Perhaps the situation in Garo Hills has gone way out of hand. It is time for the Centre to be briefed about the ground situation through a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) since the politicians are all in league with the enemies of peace and police seem hamstrung to address this pernicious problem.