SHILLONG: The National People’s Party (NPP) on Wednesday held a public meeting at Mawhati in Ri-Bhoi district, which was attended by over 12000 people.
NPP president Conrad K. Sangma indicated that the wave for a resurgent and new Meghalaya was in the offing and 2018 is going to be the year of change.
He justified the exodus of ex-Congress legislators to the NPP and said that these are leaders with capacity and quality but sadly they were never allowed to perform and work because Mukul Sangma is a dictator who prevented his colleagues to participate.
He said that the NPP on the other hand encourages people to contribute and participate to work for the public good. He urged the people to vote for the NPP to restore democracy in our state and bring about the end to the system of dictatorship and one man show.
He mentioned that in 2016 te demand of broom had come down and the main reason for that was because the government of India had plan to impose a GST of 12%. He said that when he heard about the tax, he had written to Arun Jaitley the Finance minister of India and met him to discuss the problems faced by the broom farmers. He also met different finance ministers of different state on the issue and in the month of march 2017 the GST on broom was brought down to 5% and after much continuous pressure from the NPP, in the month of May 2017, the Government of India, exempted broom from the GST.
James Sangma who also spoke in the meeting refuted allegations that the NPP is the same as the BJP.
He said that contrary to popular misconceptions the NPP is its own party with its own ideology and said that it is a party that stands for the protection of the minorities. He added that Conrad Sangma is the only MP in parliament who takes up and fight for the issues affecting the Christian community.