By Patricia Mukhim
Meghalaya gets caught in this spiral of deceit and corruption which gets worse with each incoming government. We now exist in a rolling trauma which is exhausting and unrelenting. Here is a state whose people lived on homilies that we are on this earth to earn justice and we do that by playing fair. And people’s natural default is towards truth and good because the alternative is untenable. It will lead to moral anarchy. Alas! The alternative is upon us and the killing of Cheristerfield Thangkhiew has only consolidated the outrage. And outrage has become the order of the day. The stillness of stability is shattered. These are hard days of coarse language – of catcalls that appeal to the worst in us, not the best. But verbal attacks, fair or unfair are the stock-in-trade of politics.
Interestingly amidst this psycho-babble and while the MDA Government is countering outside forces, it is trying to consolidate its internal dynamics by appointing yet another advisor to the Chief Minister. The public has lost count of the number of advisers that CM Conrad Sangma has in his armoury. The question is whether any of them are advising him and what do they advise since they are from different political parties? Is this the reason why the MDA Government is schizophrenic?
Have the advisors ever told the CM that what is happening in the Power Sector is wrong and that debts are piling up for the already ramshackle-debt-ridden Power Corporation? Obviously, those running the MDA Government are unlikely to return in 2023 and therefore their profligacy will not haunt them. It is the next government of whatever political hue which will carry the debt-burden. And considering that the Government of India is monetizing a plethora of PSUs which will include power generating corporations, there will be no way that the MeECL can carry on with its debt weight.
The Electricity (Amendment) Bill, 2021 which was to have been passed during the monsoon session this year was shelved due to the pandemonium created by the Opposition over the Pegasus spyware. But knowing Prime Minister Modi and his indomitable nature, this Bill will be passed sooner than later. The Bill empowers consumers to choose their power suppliers, and like it did with the Telecom industry, private players would bring down cost and provide better service to the public. This will not be a bad deal for a state like Meghalaya where power generation and distribution are largely state-controlled (the Power Corporation in Meghalaya would collapse in a day if the Government pulls out the financial plug). The Bill envisages to bring private players to reduce costs related to overhead lines and load-shedding. Better supply would induce better demand, resulting in better profits. Economists believe this could be a major milestone in India’s economic history, perhaps the most important reform ever. The Modi Government expects the private sector to own up 100% of electricity distribution in all urban areas in coming years and about 74% in rural-urban mixed areas. That being so, MeECL might soon see itself in a new avatar.
Let me now skip to an important point in the MDA regime. The UDP which is the MDA’s closest ally had demanded that the Home Department be taken away from James Sangma for all the malfeasance that was allowed to carry on such as illegal transportation of coal amongst others. A man from the UDP was appointed Home Minister. The illegal mining and transportation of coal has not stopped. The UDP is silent today. There was some noise about stripping James Sangma of the Power portfolio too for all the mess and corruption in the MeECL vis-à-vis the Saubhagya scheme and the smart meter project. This has suddenly died down because AL Hek of the BJP who was the biggest internal critic of the MDA government found himself stripped of his ministerial post. The PDF and HSPDP are too insignificant to raise their voices. They are content to remain with the MDA as petty players as long as they are in power. The game of political convenience has been overplayed by these regional parties. The same parties that cry hoarse about saving the ‘jaidbynriew’ don’t care a hoot what happens to that jaidbynriew under a corrupt regime that steals what is due to the people.
Interestingly, the Home Minister, a UDP man, is seen on TV giving a tutorial to legislators about what the role of the police is and what they can and cannot do. He was replying to questions raised by the Opposition on the encounter killing of the former militant – Cheristefield Thangkhiew. The Home Minister’s demeanour as he listed out stuff from the Police manual looked like a strange mix of Monalisa and the Artful Dodger. The Congress walked out on Wednesday after being disallowed by the Speaker to discuss the Thangkhiew episode. The Congress was told the matter is sub-judice. A judicial enquiry is not supervised by a court of law, hence there is nothing sub-judice about the matter. In any case all enquiries in this country and our own state are an eyewash to acquit the Government of the day, so please don’t even tell us that anything is going to come out of a judicial or any other inquiry. Often the amount paid to supreme court lawyers employed by the state to defend it from itself has made the price of investigation and justice as expensive as the offence itself.
There are ministers in the MDA Government who make no bones about owning business enterprises. Their sole interest is in cornering all businesses related to construction of roads, bridges, buildings and what have you. They never speak in the Assembly; they are never in the limelight and nor are they under the media scanner. They quietly go about their work putting pressure on the Government to put money on construction work. In fact, their entry into politics and the Government is a diligently worked out revenue model and they cannot go wrong. And people talk about them in hushed tones almost as if they are afraid of offending them.
All this sleaze has survived and is growing with each new government, because we, the articulate class have supported that style by our own incestuous preoccupations. Most of us are silent bystanders and could not care what happens to the state if our own lives are made. But this incestuous silence will cost us heavily.
Now coming to the point of governance – it takes both politicians and the bureaucracy to govern the state and the country. In Meghalaya most bureaucrats have learnt that it is best to conform because the alternative is to perish. The adage “perform or perish,” does not work for the bureaucracy here. Most are conformists. The few non-conformists survive because they are indispensable. Others who feel stifled by having to dance to the tune of politicians have long since left the state and are doing well for themselves in central ministries. The non-conformists who remain in the state find it tough to survive. The eco-system here does not support transparency, honesty or efficiency. The state would prefer to have bureaucrats that toe the political line. It’s easier for all concerned. In any case the general style of governance in Meghalaya irrespective of party has supported greed and smugness. But with time and the exposure of new scams, some ministers in this cabinet would have had so much egg on their faces that they can go on having them for breakfast until Feb 2023, which is just 16 months away. In politics time flies.
One hopes that in 2023 the people of Meghalaya will vote for parties that try and show us a future we can invest in rather than rebranding a failed but hoary past. Amen!