SHILLONG: BJP MLA and a Cabinet Minister in the state, AL Hek is of the opinion that it will not be an easy exercise for the state to get the approval from the Central government for implementation of Inner Liner Permit (ILP) in Meghalaya.
Talking to media persons here on Saturday, Hek said that the matter of implementation of the ILP has to go through several process before final nod to be given to the state.
“It is not like climbing a tree, pluck a fruit and come back,” he said while adding that the Centre would take views and opinions of different stakeholders including people from different communities, NGOs and even the Government before taking a call on the matter.
It may be mentioned that several NGOs in the state are demanding immediate implementation of ILP in the state while Meghalaya Legislative Assembly recently passed a unanimous resolution to urge the Centre to implement ILP in the state.
He said that the discussions of the Meghalaya Government with Union Home Minister, Amit Shah was inconclusive and they would continue their discussions on the matter soon after the New Year celebrations
When asked about the speculations that Centre has reportedly agrees to implement ILP but withdraw the privileges of Sixth Schedule provisions in the state, he said that these were mere speculations and there was no talk on these lines
Stating that a concrete discussions are required on the matter of implementing ILP in the state, he said that the Government had told the Union Home Minister that Citizenship Amendment Act should be totally exempted from Meghalaya.
According to Hek, he in his personal capacity also met the Union Home Minister, Amit Shah and Minister of State K Reddy to impress upon them to fully exempt Meghalaya from the CAA.
When asked if BJP would conduct awareness programmes in Meghalaya to sensitise people about the mandate of Act as per the order of the party high command, he said that they didn’t have any plan to organise such programmes in Meghalaya
“ We will see in future but first people should understand what is CAA. No one as of now understands what CAA actually is,” Hek said