By H H Mohrmen
It is often projected by prominent citizens of the state and also by leaders of various NGOs that the survival of this tiny community depends largely on whether we still own the land or in the State or not. Land is not only a meager resource but it truly is an important part of people’s life particularly in a tribal community like ours, but the pertinent question is not whether we own the land or not but rather how we use the land that we own.
It reminds me of my journey with former MLA of the state a few years ago. We were returning from Pdengchakap where the then president of the country Dr APJ Abdul Kalam laid the foundation stone of the Myntdu Lechka Hyndro electric Project. On our trip back to Jowai we hitched a ride with the MLA on his rickety jeep and throughout the journey we were talking about development or more precisely the lack of development in the state. It was during this conversation that ma Mihsalan Suchiang who is also a man of few words chipped in and said, ‘the problem is because of our land tenure system.’
The peculiar land ownership system is the cause of many projects being grounded or at least it was the cause for delay of the completion of the projects. The case in point is the Umroi Shillong airport. The reason why the Government cannot make the Shillong Umroi airport fully operational is because of long-drawn-out problems with the land owners in the area. The section where expansion of the Shillong Guwahati highway is delayed in the Umsning portion at Umsning and again the reason is the land issue. Today it is the land owner in the Khasi hills side of the river Umngot who have protested against the proposed Umngot hydro electric project and hence the delay in project implementation.
Even the most talked about Greater Shillong Water Supply Scheme is in a precarious situation since if one fine day the owners of the land which also serves as a catchment area of the river decide to clear the forest and use the land for other purposes, then we can well imagine what will happen to the water supply project. Wah Umkhrah is another obvious case of how the customary land ownership system together with an ineffective Autonomous District Council and a vision less state government has failed the State and its people miserably. This same thing will happen to Myntdu and Jowai town if we continue with our ‘do as you wish with your land’ attitude. Now even Umiam Lake is under threat from the construction on the fringes of the lake which is part of the catchment area for the lake. It is obvious that there is no rule, no regulation to govern use of land in the State. The general mindset is, ‘This is my land; I can do whatever I like with it.’
Along with the reporter of Down to Earth Magazine, we went to enquire from the officers in the Jaintia Hills Autonomous District Council, if agriculture land in the district can be converted to commercial land. The answer was ‘no problem at all,’ anybody can mutate agriculture land to any kind of land. We were even informed that in some cases community forests changed hands and were used for mining purposes. There is absolutely no rule or regulation on how land is used in this state.
In the beginning of this year, I was in a meeting on land rights at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi and in a panel chaired by B G Verghese I pointed out that unlike in the other states in the country; the problem in Meghalaya is not because of the threat from the miners or corporations and multinationals from outside who are trying to grab mineral rich land in the state, but the threat is from the rich tribal mine owners who are themselves members of the community. These same people who under the pretext of tribal rights to land ownership (a customary practice), have violated another tradition of protecting and preserving nature which the tribals call mother.
In Meghalaya, the threat within the community is when the rich grab the land of the poor. The cases where community land was captured by coal baron for their vested interests was even reported in a section of the media. The current issue (16-31 October, 2014) of Down to Earth magazine reported of land grabbing at Umkyrpong village in which a community forest land came into the pocession of a coal baron. The elite section of the community who include coal barons, politicians, bureaucrats, policemen and even surrendered militants are on a land grabbing spree as a consequence of which the environment is devastated and rivers are polluted.
Even in the case of cement companies at the eleka Narpuh, land grabbing did happen and huge areas of tribal land changed hands with the tacit support of the village headman and local representatives of the companies who were given a dummy post of local directors.
Recently an article which appeared in this paper was of the opinion that the NGT ban on mining and transport of coal in Meghalaya is wrong since it is against the prevailing land tenure system in the State. The writer alleged that the NGT interferes with the land tenure system of the people. He claimed that the ban has touched on a sensitive issue which is vital for the survival of the tribals in the state vis-à-vis their traditional land ownership system which is a customary practice. The author tried to depict the issue as a conflict between customary practices and modern laws, but the issue here is about protecting and conserving nature which also part of the customs and traditions of the tribals of Meghalaya.
Everybody knows that the NGT’s mandate is to look into cases of violation of Forest Acts and Environmental issues, so the ban in Meghalaya is not a subject of land ownership but an environmental issue. It is unfortunate that the NGT ban is painted as a Central law interfering with customary practices of the people. In fact the NGT does not care who owns the land but whoever owns the land must act responsibly and has no right to pollute water, air or destroy the forests and environment.
Land is a state subject and the state government has laws to stop or control the transfer of land from tribals to non-locals. And if in spite of the Land Transfer Act and the presence of three Autonomous District Councils we still have fear and apprehension that we are losing our land to outsiders then who can protect us from ourselves? Can we blame the NGT or any Central laws for this? Is it not true that our own leaders have failed us? We have repeatedly elected the same leaders who had failed us in the first place and yet even today, the coal mining lobbies are still hobnobbing with these same set of leaders in their efforts to invoke para 12(a) of the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. It does not matter how many laws we invoke, nobody can protect us from our greed and mining is a perfect example of how our land tenure system has failed the state and its people and we should thank the NGT for intervening and thereby protecting our environment.
The issue is that successive governments have failed to regulate and monitor mining in the state which has caused rampant destruction of the environment. If the state government was able to come up with a policy to manage, control and regulate mining in the state, there wouldn’t have been any basis for NGT to ban mining and stop the transportation of coal from the state in the first place.
The problem is not who owns the land but rather how people and the state can make the best use of the land for the general welfare of the people and development of the state. Development can happen only if government can use the land for development without any problems. But if we continue with the same attitude that we can do whatever we like with our land just because we own it then is there any chance of development in the state? Or how can the community survive if all the minerals are exploited, our environment destroyed and only poisonous water runs through our streams and rivers? What is the chance of the community surviving in that situation? What use is development then? And will our land be of any use then? The crux of the matter is land and how we are able to make the best use of this meager resource.