SHILLONG, Nov 23: Opposition leader Mukul Sangma on Wednesday asked the governments of Meghalaya and Assam to talk with each other and ensure that there is no breakdown in the law and order.
He stressed the need for ensuring such incidents do not lead to major law-and-order problems. Advising both states to be vigilant, he asked the government on either side of the interstate border to act tough if there is any attempt to create a rift between the Khasi and Assamese communities of both states.
“I did not see any endeavour in this regard from the Assam and Meghalaya authorities. They have reached the solution of shutting down mobile internet. This is not the way to deal with the situation. There is misinformation going on about hatred between different communities causing the incident, which is not correct. There’s no fight between the Khasis and the Assamese. There is no fight between the communities of Meghalaya and communities on the other side of the border,” he said.
Asking the Meghalaya government to immediately restore mobile internet, he wanted to know why the Assam government has been telling people not to come to Meghalaya.
Sangma blamed the MDA Government for “allowing” killing of five Meghalaya villagers by ignoring their pleas for protection from the constant harassment by the Assam authorities.
The party also asked the Assam and Meghalaya governments to be vigilant to ensure the incident does not snowball into a major law-and-order problem while announcing an ex-gratia payment of Rs 5 lakh to the family of each person killed in the firing at Mukroh village.
Addressing a press conference on Wednesday, Sangma expressed anguish over the incident and said party president Mamata Banerjee and national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee are in touch with them.
Sangma, who visited Mukroh soon after the incident on Tuesday, said he was perturbed to hear many stories of oppression from the people who are subjected to ill-treatment by the Assam authorities.
“The narrative is around how villagers are subjected to constant harassment and atrocities, made to live in fear and with a sense of insecurity. Their attempt to draw attention to the atrocities from our side has fallen on deaf ears. We all know that the sitting MLA belongs to the ruling coalition. This gives us a kind of perception that this whole development has been allowed,” he said.
Stating that there is a surge in cases of atrocities against people living along the Assam-Meghalaya border by the authorities of Assam, he asked why there is a knee-jerk reaction from the state government to such an incident.
In a related development, TMC national spokesperson has filed a case with the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) against the Government of Assam with regards to the tragic and shocking incident of unprovoked firing and use of lethal force by Assam police and forest guard personnel against residents of Meghalaya at Mukroh village on Tuesday leading to the death of six people, five of whom were from Meghalaya.
The case states that the five persons from Meghalaya killed in the unprovoked firing were unarmed and were members of the Scheduled Tribe who were exercising their constitutional right to forest produce. The use of lethal force against unarmed persons by Assam Forest Officials was unprovoked and illegal, Gokhale said in his complaint, while asking the NHRC to institute an immediate independent probe as well as an order to the Assam government to withdraw all its personnel who are currently stationed illegally within the territory of Meghalaya.
