Editor,
We read Patricia Mukhim’s Article,”Taking us back to a hoary past (ST Dec 12, 2014), went to sleep and had a dream. In that dream someone had turned back the clock for us and we suddenly found ourselves back to pre Independence days. As true patriotic indigenous people of Ki Khun U Hynniewtrep, we meekly subjected ourselves, to the faultless, pristine and perfect governance of our Traditional Heads. With joy we saw the provisions of the Constitution of India, torn up and thrown into the waste paper basket. We had been sheltered and pampered by the same for too long. Time we stood on our own two feet!
The 6th Schedule that had protected our identity as indigenous people for the last 67 years was finally discarded. What we always wanted! Meghalaya state hood which had provided that sense of oneness for the last 45 years was finally annulled. Actually who really believed in that ‘No Hill State, No Rest’ jargon? All the laws which we have been living under and the institutions that enforced such laws were finally abrogated. Jolly good! So did we live without rules , regulations or without laws? Definitely not! We have wise administrators in the Syiems and myntris who will frame legislations (ki adong shnong) to provide us with the most perfect social setup here on earth. Oh Boy we had a dream !
Then suddenly the dream turned into a nightmare. In place of the Constitution, the State Government, our law courts, the police and the District Administration, stood a strange formless body called the Grand Council of Chiefs (GCC). It was a creation of the prophet John K and for a national anthem it sang the ‘The sloop John B’. Maintaining peace and preventing the Himas from waging war upon one another was a major issue, especially since the GCC, poor as a church mouse, was in no position to maintain a law enforcing agency of its own. Customary laws reigned supreme and each Hima and every village had its own set of customary laws different from all others. We dubbed it Democracy and, of course, utter chaos ruled the day. But not to worry as the CIA quickly promised to send in the marines if the need ever arose.
The GCC also had a big problem with money. How to generate revenue to pay the Syiems, the myntris, the Bakhraws and the myriads of donation dependent NGOs that had mushroomed under the GCC. In true Mon Khmer style, the GCC simply ordered everyone into the countryside to grow potatoes and revolutionise an aloo economy. Shades of Pol Pot but what else was there to do? As hospitals and health care centres collapsed, the GCC ordered everyone, on the pain of death, not to fall sick. The Himas simply couldn’t afford the doctors. As no one had money to buy books, attending school was declared illegal. ISIS and the Taliban immediately declared Shillong as the centre of the Universe. In our dreams we saw hungry people; starving people; dying people. We were hungry but The Instrument of Accession; the Treaty of Merger and the Standstill Agreement failed to provide the food we needed. The Khasis became desperate. They were on their death throes. They screamed; we screamed and woke up in a cold sweat. Thank God it was only a Dream!
Yours etc.,
DS Lyngdoh Mawnai,
West Khasi Hills
Well-intentioned rape of the moors
Editor,
A simple image-search for Scottish moors on the internet yields lovely reminders of one of the several reasons why Shillong and its environs is sometimes fondly called, “The Scotland of the East”, by people who knew well what they were talking about. Basically, many of the moors of Scotland look quite like the moors on the way from Shillong to Cherrapunji / Sohra,.. making clear that both are historically and naturally treeless landscapes.
And so, the undoubtedly well-intentioned tree plantation that can now be seen to have been done on some of these moors of Meghalaya is possibly an undesirable human intervention upon unique and pretty pristine ecosystems, that should be urgently reviewed before irreversible damage might be done.
Yours etc.,
Shankar Barua
Via email
Oh the awful trucks!
Editor,
Can somebody explain why suddenly trucks are coming from everywhere through our city. Our vehicles get clamped on the slightest error whereas these night killer monsters get off scot free by passing the Bye-pass. I appeal to all the NGO’s, pressure groups to please act and save us who are to travel head on daily against these monsters.
Yours etc.,
Edward War.
Via email