SHILLONG: One solution of the Meghalaya Government to protect the indigenous tribals of the State against exploitation by outsiders may be to bring about a comprehensive amendment to the Meghalaya Transfer of Land (Regulation) Act, 1971.
In reply to a question from UDP legislator Paul Lyngdoh, Deputy Chief Minister in charge of Revenue and Disaster Management Prof. R.C. Laloo informed in the Assembly on Friday that the Meghalaya Government has plans to bring about a strong and effective Land Transfer Act to prevent transfer of tribal land to non-tribals.
“We are also working seriously if not actively in these lines. We are taking time to complete the process since we would like to come up with something very comprehensive to pluck out all the glaring lacunae in the existing Land Transfer Act,” Prof. Laloo said. Stressing the need for a comprehensive and fool-proof amendment to the 1971 Act to prevent any kind of exploitation of tribal land by non-tribal entities, Lyngdoh said that a piecemeal approach of the Government to bring an amendment to the Act would not serve the purpose.
“The lacunae in the existing Act had allowed fly- by-night operators like C.M. Jha to exploit and take advantage of the situation,” Lyngdoh said.
He said that the State Government needed to adopt some serious steps to bring in strong amendments to the existing Act to protect and promote the interest of the local indigenous people.
The UDP legislator also asked if the Government would actively consider the possibility of incorporating the views and suggestions of different stakeholders, NGOs and elected representatives in the proposed amendment to the existing Act.
In reply to the supplementary question of Opposition leader Dr. Donkupar Roy, the Deputy Chief Minister informed that the Government had initiated several amendments to the existing Act in the past, the last amendment being made in 2003.
He informed that views from different departments on representations received from NGOs including Social Organization of Meghalaya Against Land Alienation (SOMALA) were under examination of the government.
The Deputy Chief Minister informed that the NGOs had demanded an amendment of section 4(1) (e) and (f) of the existing Act.
