Editor,
We want to congratulate the Pyndengrei Sports Club for the triumphant victory of the NDSA football tournament super division 2016 which was held on 8th of December 2016. The hard work of all the players and the office bearers of the club as a whole has genuinely paid off. The return of the former secretary of the club, Phirat Marweiñ to the field to manage the team once again and his tactic of exchanging of players on the right timing was truly his masterpiece and a stroke of genius. The goal scored by Teiborlang Sohlangpiaw a senior player of the team and the efforts put the captain and by all the players has led the team to this massive victory. We also want to congratulate the rival team Nongpyndeng FC for having worked so hard to reach the Finals and face off with the Champion team Pyndengrei SC. We would like to thank the NDSA for this beautiful tournament which truly resonated the beauty of football and sports which has united the Nongstoiñ locality as a whole.
Yours etc.,
Mickey Marweiñ & Pilez Lyngdoh Marshillong,
Via email
25 years of economic reforms & Meghalaya
Editor,
American country superstar, Alan Jackson released a beautiful touching song,”Where were you when the world stop turning “as a rallying song for the American people in the aftermath of September 11, 2001.The American nation was shaken to the core and the whole world sympathised with them through their moment of grief and loss. 25 years on after the biggest economic reforms in our own country, can we ask ourselves another question? Where were we when the wheels started spinning for the Indian economy? 1991 was the year that India experienced the mother of all crisis which in turn led to the biggest economic reforms in the country and India has not looked back ever since. As a young toddler I was still singing nursery rhymes and learning to write a,b,c in nursery school when that momentous occasion took place. The rest of you reading this letter might not have been born or some of you may have gone through the most important phases in your lives like starting a family or watching your children graduate from college during that period. The pertinent question we should ask ourselves this very moment is whether we are even aware that such a change took place in the country or are most of us so caught up in our own small worlds that we even failed to realize the fact that India went through a life changing experience in 199? The one visible effect of 1991 that all of us who grew up in an urban setting might have experienced but never knew that it was the side effect of what happened in 1991 was the onset of cable television. I grew up in a middle class family in the heart of the city. My parents had purchased a new colour TV a few years after I was born and immediately after 1991 a rich neighbour who lives just a few metres from our home had just installed one of those big cable dish. So the after school period in those years were spent in taking instructions from my big brother to move the antenna so as to make it point towards that big cable dish as far as possible in the hope that our TV set might be able to catch our favourite channels like Channel V and Star Movies. Seeing Bryan Adams strumming his guitar in those days was like heaven to us and we kept on waiting for our favourite Richard Marx song to appear on TV. On a more serious note we should be ashamed of ourselves that the only visible impact that the reforms of 1991 left in our lives are memories of watching cable television. If good politics is all about good governance and good governance is all about effective economic policies and clean governance, then where is Meghalaya as a State at this very moment?
Yours etc.,
Gary Marbaniang,
Via email