NPP President, Conrad Sangma’s win was predictable because the Garo people are astute voters. That the Chief Ministerial candidate won with a thumping majority by securing 8421 votes over his nearest rival from the Congress, is a thumbs up for Conrad Sangma and the NPP. Three of Conrad’s rival candidates from South Tura even lost their security deposits. This also shows Conrad Sangma’s personal credibility as much as it is also a vote for the MDA Government that he leads. The Ranikor result on the other hand was a setback for the NPP collectively and a personal loss for the former Congress MLA and now NPP candidate, Martin Danggo. With this election Danggo ends his five-year journey as MLA from Ranikor. It is this over-confidence perhaps that also made an over-ambitious Danggo resign his seat; change his party and contest from the NPP. There is a limit beyond which the electorate will not tolerate such political shenanigans. The 27 year old Pius Marwein who lost the February elections by a slim margin of 400 votes but his tenacity won in the long run.
While the Congress and NPP are presently both at 20 seats each, the MDA seems set for a full term since the coalition partners are unlikely to rock the boat and team up with the Congress Party who they have all fought against in the last elections. However, a premature assertion by the UDP, that their newest trophy Pius Marwein be given a cabinet berth, does not bode well for the coalition. This is more like a bombastic claim by a party with just 8 candidates in a House of 60. Here comes the maturity of the UDP President, Donkupar Roy who remained calm and never spoke a word that was out of place even after this phenomenal win.
Now that Conrad Sangma has established himself as an elected CM he can begin to take the MDA on a new trajectory of planned progress and a new economic growth path. Already the MDA has been trying to bring out policies on key areas such as Education but they need to do that for Health, Tourism, Mining, Agriculture and Horticulture too. Without a road-map and goal-setting the Government cannot set benchmarks for itself and the public too would find it difficult to assess the achievements of the Government at the end of its term. It is this perhaps that has made previous governments shun the policy-making exercise. The MDA can now hit the ground running.
