Editor,
The picture on the front page of the Shillong Times Friday, August 8th, 2014, depicting a group of five prosperous looking elected Congress representatives from Meghalaya, surrounding the President of India, is the most defining picture of Meghalaya politics ever taken. The gentlemen from all accounts had gone to plead for Presidential intervention against the prevailing NGT ban on rat hole mining. They had gone to brief the President about collapsed livelihoods and resulting starvation in our state. The irony of the situation couldn’t have been lost on many – corpulent, well fed emissaries on behalf of an alleged starving population! Common sense demands that Brand Ambassadors of starvation should at least possess trimmer waistlines! The President must have had a hard time suppressing a laugh. For God’s sake, in future, can we manage such events without making the rest of us the laughing stock of the whole nation, Please!
All the above emissaries had been elected more than once and every one had had a tenure as Minister at one time or the other. One has been MP twice another the Chief Minister of the state more than five times. Each one of them had at one time or the other been Chief Guests at functions calling for urgent environmental preservation. Functions organised by schools, innocent children and those eager to live decent lives in a pollution free world. What did these VIPs say then? What words of wisdom did they spew on how to save the world from environmental disasters? Today we see them urging the President of India to scrap the most significant step ever taken to save Meghalaya’s fragile environment. I did say a defining moment for Meghalayan politics. Perhaps hypocrisy of the highest order would define it best!
Then there is that whole plea for retaining traditional mining customs and the need to lift the NGT ban to rescue livelihoods in Meghalaya. RS Shullai’s “The coal mafia and their pets” (ST Aug 9, 2014) has adequately dealt with the issue and so there is no need to repeat the same here. Just enough to say that its most encouraging to see this sudden concern our honourable representatives have over dwindling livelihoods in Meghalaya. Honestly it’s the first time our politicians seem so concerned over the issue that they have to take it right up to Rastrapati Bhavan. One must however point out that if people are genuinely concerned about livelihoods then alternate means of sustainable livelihoods can be thought of. Lifting the NGT ban is not the only answer towards saving livelihoods. But to get back to the topic of the picture ops with the President of India, perhaps next time lets to it with a bit more of dignity, please. Perhaps we can do it without that pathetic, utterly humiliating and wretched look of Poor Little Rich Boys with begging bowls in their hands.
Yours etc.,
Toki Blah,
Via email
Political immaturity or what?
Editor,
Teacher-turned politician Ampareen Lyngdoh showed why she has remained a political novice despite being in power for a considerable period of time. Her recent statement blaming the militancy in Garo Hills on the NGT ban cannot be surpassed in terms of bad logic. Is Ms Lyngdoh really so ignorant of events in Garo Hills or is there, as one suspects, an ulterior motive for her statement? How can she link an event which happened a few months back to the decade-long Garo Hills militancy problem? Has she forgotten it was her Government which has been in power for most of this time? One can understand wanting to protect the “boss” who saved her from the job scam, but a statement as dumb as this one makes me wonder why she ever took up politics as a career. Ms Lyngdoh would have done splendidly if she had taken up a career as chief spokesperson of the coal miners instead of her chosen profession.
Yours etc.,
Bryson Marak
Shillong-3