By H.H.Mohrmen
It is countdown to the polling day and any politically active citizen will just have one question to worry about and that is who will win the election. Nobody has the answer to that question until all the votes polled in the all EVMs are counted, but that cannot stop one from trying to guess, study the trends and also come up with one’s own estimation of the chances of the candidates winning the election to the 16th Lok Sabha. In fact this is going to be the most popular activity that people will indulge in till the votes are finally counted on May 16.
I can’t claim that I have followed the candidates on their campaign trail. I haven’t met all the candidates of the Shillong parliamentary constituency either, but what I can proudly claim is that I have attended the meetings of all the candidates who came to campaign in Jowai. And if the number of the crowd that came to listen to their speeches during the campaign is a sign of how popular the candidate is, then all the candidates are equally poised to win the election.
Paul Lyngdoh the UDP candidate to the Shillong parliamentary constituency began his speech in Pnar; it comes naturally because he has few thousands Pnar voters in his LA constituency and of course his other half is also a Pnar he said. Paul hit at the Congress on influx issue and blamed the party for the prevailing situation in the state. He criticized the government for the price rise of essential commodities, the delay in solving the interstate border despite the fact that the Congress governments are in power in the two states and at the Centre.
PBM Basaiawmoit the retired pastor of the Presbyterian Church spoke in chaste Pnar throughout the meeting. He seems to know the district better than any other non-Jaintia candidate or maybe he knows about the district better than the candidates who were born and brought up in the Jaintia hills.
The BJP candidate Shibun Lyngdoh, even if new to politics does not disappoint his supporters or any of those who attend his meeting and spends much of the time clarifying the misinformation that was spread against his party. Not surprisingly Shibun is sailing along on the Modi wave and hopes that he will benefit from it and win the election. What struck me about Amerington Kharshiing the AAP candidate is that unlike his fellow candidates, he does not even ask for votes before concluding his speech. In a major departure from the usual practice, he did not request the public for their support but instead asked the voters to decide whom they would like vote for in the coming election.
All the three candidates namely Paul Lyngdoh, Shibun Lyngdoh and PBM Basaiawmoit used the same stick to beat the Congress candidate with and the common issues that they blamed the Congress for are the issue of influx, price rise of essential commodities, the never-ending price hike of all petroleum products, the party’s failure to solve the interstate boundary dispute, slowdown of economic growth, FDI and the non-performance of the incumbent MP and Congress candidate Vincent H Pala. Perhaps one would question what does FDI have to do with Meghalaya? Well this is the issue that is going to cause a huge crack in the Congress vote bank at least in the coal mine areas. The opposition blamed the slowdown in coal trade which has affected all those who depends for their livelihood on this business on FDI. They blamed the UPA government for allowing FDI on coal; hence cheaper and better coal is being imported from outside the country which directly affected the coal trade in Meghalaya.
I was disappointed that none of the candidates spoke about the need to protect the environment; none even mentioned sustainable development in their election speeches. In fact I was surprised to learn from his speech that the former pastor had lobbied hard on behalf of the coal mine owners even when he was in his earlier vocation vis-à-vis the mining policy. Only Shibun Lyngdoh mentioned the caves as one possible attraction for tourists to the state of Meghalaya.
For the Congress the saying, ‘you clean my backside; I clean yours’ (pardon the language) aptly described how the party went about campaigning in the election at least in Jowai. Dr. R.C. Laloo worked hard to organize pocket campaigns in almost every locality of the town and in his speech he credited all the projects in the district to the MP. The credit for the Shillong bypass project, the Jowai bypass, the B.Ed College in Jowai, the beautification of Syntu Ksiar and everything else was attributed to the MP. Pala was even praised for being able to convince the Planning Commission to allocate huge financial allocations to the state every year. One wonders what will happen in 2018 when it’s time for Dr R C Laloo to hit the campaign trail again. If the credit for all the projects is being given to Pala, what is left for him to claim in 2018? Well, your guess is as good as mine that in four years time Pala will then come to canvass for Laloo and give him the credit for the same projects and this will go on, and that is politics.
The story that there is an effort to sabotage the election of VH Pala by some Congress and independent MLAs of the MUA is not unfounded. There is an old saying in Khasi which says “Ki sla kim ju khih khlem da beh ka lyer’ (Leaves do not move if there is no wind.’ This is another factor that is playing against Pala and it remains to be seen if it can spoil Pala’s chances of retaining the Shillong parliamentary seat for the Congress.
What will be the verdict of the people? One thing that is certain is that the anti-incumbency factor is going to spoil Pala’s prospect of retaining the Shillong seat and his chances of winning depend on how much the Congress can mitigate the attack on his performance which is measured by where and how he distributed his MPLAD schemes.
It is true that there is a wave for the former priest in the Jaintia hills and it is also true that most of his supporters are friends that he knew from his association with the church in his previous job, but the question is why was this trend missing in the last election in 2009? The problem for Basaiawmoit is the lack of grass roots units and the fact that neither the KHNAM nor the HSPDP has any significant presence in the district is going to be a hindrance to their candidate’s chance of winning the election. But the factors that go against the regional interest is the split in regional parties vote bank. This will only help one party and that is the Congress. There is a wave for the BJP candidate too, especially in the East Jaintia hills district, but the BJP is also going to be afflicted by the same problem of not having units at the grass roots level.
Metaphorically speaking, if it is football match, a candidate can be in control of the game and the candidate may even have more than 70% of ball position and great tactics too, but if he is lacking the most important skill of converting the advantage to goals, then everything else is futile. That is why we need units at the local level; units can play a vital role in motivating reluctant and undecided voters to cast their votes. Here is where unit comes handy and this is where an organized party like the UDP and the Congress which have their presence in most parts of the state has the advantage over independent candidates and candidates backed by small parties. The advantage of having a well organized party with active units also ensures that parties already have captive voters in hand. Having said that, it is also worth noting, that independent candidates or candidates backed by parties which do not have units in the entire constituency, also have winning chances if they have the love and support of the people. The chances of independent candidates or the candidate supported by new and smaller parties winning is remote unless there is a huge swing of votes towards any one of them.
In fine people know best and let the best candidate win.