Focus will be on core issues: Mukul

SHILLONG: Chief Minister Dr Mukul Sangma has said Wednesday’s crucial meeting with the pro-ILP pressure groups would focus on the core issues to find out the best possible mechanism to address the issue of influx.

“Many good things, I expect, will unfold during the course of our discussion,” Dr Sangma said here on Wednesday.

He hoped that the members of the pro-ILP pressure groups who would be taking part in the crucial meeting would come with an open mind.

When asked on the pressure groups’ demand for the release all their arrested activists, Dr Sangma said, “The matter needs to be examined from legal perspective.”

Claiming that Government has already sent a positive message by not making any further arrest, he said that the concerned departments had been told to examine legal aspects of everything.

The pro ILP groups recently had demanded the release of the activists of different groups who were arrested during the three-month-long agitations which started in September last year.

It may be mentioned that the state especially the capital city Shillong has been on the boil since September 2 after the pro-ILP groups called for a series of agitations crippling normal life.

The three-month ILP agitations have also claimed the lives of three persons and damaged properties- both public and private worth crore of rupees. The government has even charged the pro-ILP NGOs with sponsoring the shutdowns, picketing and blockades which the government said were “unconstitutional and illegal”.

The government has also formed special courts to ensure that the pro-ILP groups compensate for the damages caused during the agitation sponsored by them.

The state government has filed a damage suit of over Rs 31 crore to be realized from all the agitating pressure groups. 71 persons have been arrested during the pro-ILP agitation while two activists were arrested under Meghalaya Preventive Detention Act (MPDA).