MAWKYRWAT: Ninety-five-year-old anti-uranium activist Spility Lyngdoh Langrin, deemed ‘Mother’ of all those who stood up against uranium mining, was on Saturday laid to rest in Domiasiat, a land with a huge deposit of uranium.
During the funeral ceremony, the grandson-in-law recalled Spility’s nature of helping people as well as her unfaltering dissent to uranium mining.
“In 1986, she realised that the companies have violated all conditions in the agreement that she signed for temporary permission to explore minerals at Domiasiat. In 1990, the government issued a preliminary order that it wants to take the land for its requirement but she rejected and in 1991, she wrote a letter to the government and to the then-prime minister of India, informing that the temporary permission has been cancelled,” he said.
Rev. Basawiamoit called upon her children, grandchildren, great grandchildren and the Lyngdoh Langrin clan as a whole to follow in the footsteps of Spility. “All of you should stand firm in what Spility had fought for. Don’t cut the chain which had started long time back. All of us, including the KSU and other NGOs, will continue and will not break the chain but will break the chain of injustice and inequality,” he said.
KSU central body president, Lambokstar Marngar, expressed grief over the loss and said, “It will be difficult to find another person in this generation who was strong like Mei-ieit Spility.”
Others who spoke during the condolence meeting include NESO chairman Samuel B Jyrwa, LYWA president BS Lyngdoh, Environmentalist Dr. Bremly Wanbantei B Lyngdoh and members of other NGOs.
The coffin was draped with the flag of KSU as a mark of respect for her fight against uranium mining.