TURA: Destruction of natural forest cover to make way for jhum cultivation in the Nokrek national biosphere region thereby threatening the catchment areas that feed Simsang and Ganol rivers, illegal stone mining in dozens of quarries leading to the disappearance of dozens of hills in the plain belt region and the widespread pollution of streams that once could have been an alternative source of water supply to the people of Tura town were some of the worrying factors raised by a delegation of the Meghalaya Legislative Assembly Committee on Environment which is currently touring the Garo Hills region.
Led by its Chairman and MLA, S K Sunn together with state MLAs Himalaya Shangpliang, Miani D Shira, Kimfa S Marbaniang and Rakkam A Sangma, Co-opted member and college professor Garland Star Swett, the delegation, on their first ever visit to the region, interacted with members of the media from the Garo Hills on Wednesday evening at Tura circuit house where they highlighted their findings from the field trips they conducted across the region.
Some of the areas identified as potential environmental degradation by the delegation included the Tura Municipal Board dumping ground at Rongkhon Songgital, Tura Super market, Nakham Bazar and various streams of the town.
The committee plans to submit its findings to the Speaker of the Meghalaya Assembly and, in two weeks, will be summoning the district authorities to Shillong to ascertain the actions taken on the issues flagged by the committee during their visit to Garo Hills.
Two of the biggest worries for the delegation was the continuing destruction of the forest cover in Nokrek biosphere region and the large scale illegal quarrying of boulders and stones from Garo Hills to neighbouring Assam and even Bangladesh through the plain belt region.
“Source of water from the catchment areas is getting reduced each season due to expansion of jhumming. No alternative source of livelihood has been created for the villagers to wean them away from jhumming and government has taken up no follow up action to find an alternative for the past two years. Soon people of Tura and Garo Hills will face water shortage and a massive erosion of the soil due to deforestation,” warned committee chairman S K Sunn while interacting with the media on Wednesday evening. They intend to press the government to come up with alternative sources of income for the villagers to help wean them away from jhum cultivation and save the forests.
Committee member H M Shangpliang revealed that their visit to the plain belt region bordering Assam revealed widespread illegal quarrying of stones and boulders to both Assam and Bangladesh.
“There is rampant destruction of the forests and hills to extract boulders and stones all the way from Damjonggre in Selsella to Jamgal and Dolbari and we found no presence of any government department or police in the area. Unaccountable illegal mining is taking place which needs to be stopped,” pointed out committee member H M Shangpliang.
The committee has decided to press the state government to set up a weighbridge in the area to check the siphoning off of highly valuable resources from the state to neighbouring states and countries.
Other members of the committee, Ampati MLA Miani D Shira, Siju-Rongara MLA Rakkam A Sangma, MLA Kimfa Marbaniang also brought to light the widespread violation of environmental norms by markets in Tura and neighbouring towns such as Rongram and Garobadha which are having a telling effect on the people living downstream, its impact on the ongoing construction of the Ganol hydel project and proper waste disposal of bio-medical waste.
The media also threw questions at the delegation on the lack of garbage bins in market places in Tura, failure of authorities to check car wash centres from releasing toxic waste into the streams of the town, the need for incinerators in hospitals and finding of an alternative site for garbage disposal and putting a check on the mushrooming of illegal brick kilns in agricultural lands.