TURA, March 9: As the Opposition leader Mukul Sangma continues to draw a spate of scathing attacks for lending his support to participation by non-tribals in the GHADC elections, the Federation of Khasi-Jaintia and Garo People (FKJGP) from Garo Hills has became the latest one to castigate his stand.
The Federation, in a statement on Tuesday, alleged that the veteran Congress leader made the statement as he could not come to terms with the successive government’s idea to rectify the problems faced in the Council.
“If his convictions are that simple, he may as well care to answer why the GHADC is, till date, functioning without any Service Rules or Finance Rules? Maybe he is convinced that it too was the plan of the founding fathers. Maybe our learned leader cannot come to terms with the idea that successive government has done little to nothing in terms of rectifying or augmenting the GHADC as that will include his own government, too. He may as well attribute the drastic demographic changes in the plain-belt regions of Garo Hills to the founding fathers of Meghalaya,” FKJGP president, Pritam Arengh, said.
With regard to Mukul’s “relentless focus on the principle of inclusivity”, Arengh said that principle of inclusivity cannot be implied upon every theme, the understanding of which has motivated a section of the society for demanding the exclusion of non-tribal entities from the electoral process of the Council.
“GHADC is the product of the 6th Schedule to the Indian Constitution which deals exclusively in the matters of the tribal communities of India and thus, we don’t find any merit in the participation of non-tribal entities in the GHADC elections. The basic principle upon which we are objecting to the participation of non-tribal in GHADC election is simple, non-tribals do not understand the way of life of the tribal people and thus, should not be participate in the GHADC which deals in the traditional institutions of the Garo community,” Arengh said, while adding that the founding fathers who started the Hill State Movement were not motivated by the principle of inclusivity but by the prospect of segregation from Assam.
On Mukul’s statement that nobody should take the law into their own hands, Arengh said even in the last GHADC elections, the FKJGP – along with the GSU, AYWO, ADE and FAF – had called for the boycott of the GHADC elections.
“We let the people decide as per their own judgement, and today once again leave it to the judgement of the people whether or not they will participate in the elections,” Arengh added.
