It took over thirty six hours after the swearing- in ceremony on March 7, for the portfolios to be allocated to respective ministers. In a coalition government allocating portfolios is an arduous task but that task has to be completed sooner than later because governance cannot be kept in abeyance. A new minister taking over a department, especially a rank newcomer into the ministry, would need time to familiarise himself/herself with the rules of business. Some Departments more than others have been the focus of the electorate and political aspirants during the election campaign. They include Education, Health, Agriculture, Tourism, Roads, Water Supply, Power among others. These were the departments that were seen to be lagging behind. Though not much focus was given to Community and Rural Development (C&RD) this is a key department – a fulcrum around which rural development is centred. This Department requires strict monitoring since most central schemes and the MNREGA are routed through it. While MNREGA has worked to an extent in creating community assets by way of footpaths and interior roads, fish ponds etc., other infrastructure remain incomplete.
The Deen Dayal Antyodaya Yojana or the National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM) remains largely on paper. Rural livelihoods have not taken off and this is one reason for large scale urban migration. Poverty is writ large on the faces of rural folks who depend largely on agriculture that has remained largely unproductive. Farming on small farmlands which are taken on lease is a precarious livelihood option. It is time for the Department of Economics and Statistics to get to work and capture authentic data on the number of BPL households and rural landlessness. The last socio-economic caste survey was conducted in 2011. It found 76% of rural Meghalayans landless. This is 2023. Have things got better? Did Government of Meghalaya undertake any intervention to address the landlessness issue?
Next is the Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana (SAGY) a village development project launched by Government of India in October 2014, under which each Member of Parliament will take the responsibility of developing physical and institutional infrastructure in three villages by 2019. The goal is to develop three Adarsh Grams by March 2019, of which one would be achieved by 2016. Thereafter, five such Adarsh Grams (one per year) will be selected and developed by 2024. On this we have only heard of one Rajya Sabha MP adopting Kongthong village and the nearby villages too.
Then we have the Shyama Prasad Mukherji Rurban Mission (SPMRM) which aims at developing 300 Rurban clusters, in the next five years. The aim of this scheme is to develop a cluster of villages that preserve and nurture the essence of rural community life with focus on equity and inclusiveness without compromising with the facilities perceived to be essentially urban in nature, thus creating a cluster of “Rurban Villages. The purpose is to stimulate local economic development while enhancing basic services and creating well planned Rurban clusters. The villagers don’t know of many of these schemes and hence cannot access them. With weak or no monitoring most schemes are completed only on paper. Meghalaya needs a robust monitoring mechanism. Business as usual will no longer work.