By H H Mohrmen
The National Green Tribunal ban on mining and transportation of coal in Meghalaya has become the most talked about subject in the entire state. In fact the state was bombarded with news reports about those who were affected by the ban and of the different organizations claiming to represent them almost on a daily basis. People talk about it in the teashops, houses of the bereaved families and almost everywhere. It has even become a theme on some of the communities ‘rongs’ in the last two Behdieiñkhlams. And not surprisingly in the more urban Jowai, the themes are pro-environment conservation while in Tuber there is a ‘rong’ with a message which says ‘NGT is killing us.’
I am surprised because the indigenous religion Niamtre is what one would call a green religion since not only do people respect nature and pay obeisance to some natural formations/entities like rivers, hills and mountains but people also worship Mother Earth as goddess ‘ka bei Ram-aw’ and consider the hills and the forests as dwelling places of the gods ‘u Ryngkaw u Basa.’ One would expect that people would only happily support the NGT ban because it helps protect and preserve these natural phenomenons which they consider as sacred while mining on the other hand had destroyed all the forests and killed all the streams and the rivers that they still consider as sacred.
Mining has not only killed creeks and rivers but it has most importantly disconnected people from nature which their ancestors had for so long considered sacred because it provides and sustains all their needs. This was evident from the statement made by Bolios Swer the leader of Coal Miners association in Jaintia hills in the first meeting of the organization since the NGT ban when he informed the gathering that he was surprised that the complaint on the basis of which the NGT banned mining and transporting of coal had all the names of the rivers and the rivulet in the East Jaintia hills and admitted that even he does not know the existence of most of these streams and rivers. I encountered a similar incident at Lad Sutnga while returning from Nongkhlieh area; we saw local residents queuing for water near a water tanker and stopped to ask them how much they paid for a container of water? The answer was it depends on the sizes of the containers; it starts from Rs 10 to Rs 50. I asked them why they had to buy water and whether there was no source of water nearby. The answer I got was that there is a small stream nearby but it is of no use now. When I asked them if they knew the name of the brook, the answer was ‘no.’ This is because we’ve lost touch with nature which is our sole provider and sustainer of life, to mining. And yet we still claim to be tribals who keep their traditions intact and follow their customary practices diligently.
Compare this scenario with a place where there is no mining activity and take for example Jowai where Myntdu is known by different names. From its place of origin till the famous tourist spot a distance of say about 3 kilometers only, Myntdu is known as Pynthor neiñ, ?ngkieiñ pamblah, Chah-tngit, Chka-Jwai, Treiongriang, Mupiah, Rampyrthai, Madiah kmain blai, Syntu Ksiar, Lynter and etc. People who still live close to the nature not only know the names of the rivers and their tributaries but they have different names for different parts of the river. They not only call rivers by affectionate names like the people of Kharkhana call Myntdu ‘Mu Chyrkiang,’ great grandmother, in Jowai. Myntdu is worshipped as the guardian angel ‘ka tawiar ka takan.’ These are the Tribal ways of life that the Sixth Schedule is mandated to protect; not the lifestyle that only seeks to destroys it.
We shamelessly use the Sixth schedule which is supposed to protect our tribal entity to justify our right to mine coal and ironically it is the same mining that kills our tradition and culture. A visit to any mining area will make one realize that it has become a commercial area with no semblance of tribal life anywhere. We all love the Sixth Schedule so let us try to uphold it and the NGT ban is in keeping with the spirit of this Schedule of the Constitution in. Let us not use the Sixth Schedule for our vested interests but instead try to keep the true spirit of the law and that is to protect and preserve the cultures and traditions of the people.
Recently another organization which claims to protect the rights of the tribal people in the state came out of the blue and joined the band wagon. Erwin.K Sutnga the leader of the organization had in his first media briefing stated that he agrees that protection of the environment is the paramount duty of every citizen of the state but what contradicts his statement is that the organization is fighting to lift the NGT ban and tries it’s all out effort to circumvent all the rules and regulation that it is supposed to protect and preserve the environment. I am just a layman but a lawyer of repute that he is would very well know that one cannot protect and preserve the environment without rules and regulation. The NGT ban is the first step towards that direction. There are rules both written and by convention that governs the way we do things. Sony L. Khyriem former leader of the Shillong Tourist Taxi Association would know that taxi drivers need a professional driver’s license to drive a commercial vehicle. Likewise vehicles need to have all the necessary documents and most importantly the permit to be able to ply as a commercial vehicle. How can we then propose that mining in the state should continue without any regulation because it is a traditional customary practice? How can we say that the ban should be lifted because people have lost their livelihoods, when we know that the mining activity in the state is being carried sans rules and regulations? Are we trying to say that if people had earned their livelihood by selling drugs then we have no right to stop it, even if we know that it is illegal? Can we justify an illegal activity simply because many people are involved in the business? Two wrongs cannot make anything right and we need to call a spade a spade. The government has to start somewhere and the NGT is just doing that by pressuring the State Government to take concrete steps to regulate mining in the state.
We have governments which have always made tall claims to protect the environment but did nothing on the ground except planting trees which wither away the following winter. They waste time and public money and even invite stake holders to the many meetings to draft the state Mines and Mineral Policy only to keep it under wraps. This government has not only failed in its duty to protect the environment but obviously it has failed in its duty to uphold the NGT ban. There were reports of violations of the ban. Now the question is who should be held responsible for the violation? Is it the government or the coal miners? And if legal action can be taken against the leaders of the pressure groups for creating law and order problem during the ILP protest, then the leaders of the coal mine owners association who are also respondents in the case should be taken to task for the violation of the law. Clearly people who violated the ban have no respect for the rule of law and the government which turns its nelson’s eye to what is happening is only encouraging them.
We can’t go on like this; we need to put on our thinking caps and start discussing steps that we can take to protect and preserve our environment. Let us remind ourselves of the famous indigenous wisdom which says: “We do not inherit this world from our parents; we simply borrow it from our children.” What kind of World do we want to hand over to our children? Is it not enough that we’ve already killed their rivers, polluted land and destroyed their forests? How many more rivers do we want to kill? How much more money do we want to earn by destroying our environment? And another famous Native American wisdom says: “Until the last river dries and until the last leaf falls we will not realize that we cannot eat money.” Let us start regulating mining and prevent the state from becoming a natural catastrophe.