By Napoleon S Mawphniang
We’ve walked past it countless times, haven’t we? That imposing structure – The Lok Bhavan, they call it. The House of the People. A beautiful name… almost poetic in its democratic promise. But here’s the thing about beautiful names—they can mask ugly truths. Like calling a prison a “correctional facility” or describing our endless waiting as “patience.” George Orwell understood this linguistic sleight of hand better than most. He’d have had a field day with “Lok Bhavan.”
Because let’s be honest with each other. When was the last time any of us—ordinary citizens, without political connections or influential surnames—actually walked through those gates? When did that “House of the People” truly belong to the people?
The Governor’s Theatre of Governance:
Governor CH Vijayashankar declared in August 2025 that “Raj Bhavan belongs to the people of Meghalaya and its doors are open for citizens with valid concerns”. A magnanimous statement. Almost moving. Except… except it rings hollow when you’re standing outside those very gates, watching the security guards size you up, calculating your worth by your clothes, your vehicle, your connections.
The Governor says “forget the protocol”. But protocols, we’ve learned, aren’t easily forgotten when they serve as convenient barriers. They’re like Kafka’s doorkeeper in “Before the Law”—always there, always preventing entry, always suggesting that perhaps today isn’t the right day, perhaps your concern isn’t quite “valid” enough.
In January 2026, we watched the Governor meet with 25 selected youth for the Viksit Bharat Young Leaders Dialogue. A nice photo opportunity. He spoke about leadership being “rooted in character, quality and service to society”. Beautiful words. We need to ask though—where is this service when it comes to the issues that actually haunt our sleep? Where is this leadership on the Inner Line Permit? On the 8th Schedule recognition for our Khasi language?
The Silence on What Actually Matters:
Here’s what keeps us up at night: The ILP demand has been languishing since 2019. The Meghalaya Assembly passed a resolution. Our Chief Minister Conrad Sangma has met with Union Home Minister Amit Shah multiple times—in September 2025, July 2025, and before. MP Ricky AJ Syngkon has pleaded with the Centre. The matter remains “pending with the Union Home Ministry”.
And the Khasi language? The Khasi Authors’ Society has been fighting for over four decades—since 1979, to be precise. Four decades of memorandums, seminars, delegations. Four decades of watching other languages get added to the 8th Schedule while ours waits in bureaucratic purgatory. As KAS president DRL Nonglait noted, the demand “remains pending with the Union Ministry of Home Affairs”.
But where is the Governor in all this?
You see, here’s what most people don’t know—and what the comfortable silence from Lok Bhavan hopes we’ll never discover. Under the Constitution of India, the Governor of a state with significant tribal populations wields extraordinary powers. Through PESA (Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas Act) and provisions under the Fifth Schedule, a Governor can “allow or disallow any law or development programme in tribal areas to protect self governance and development needs”. They can make regulations, annul laws, even override state regulations—all to protect tribal interests.
The National Commission for Scheduled Tribes has actually indicted Governors for “not performing their special administrative roles” in tribal areas. These aren’t ceremonial powers. These are teeth. Real constitutional teeth that could bite on our behalf.
The Dostoevskian Absurdity of It All:
There’s something almost Dostoevskian about this entire arrangement, isn’t there? We maintain this elaborate apparatus—the Governor, the Raj Bhavan, the staff, the security, the convoys, the ceremonies. We pour public money into it (while our state budget shows we’re 75% dependent on central funds and 39% of our revenue receipts go to committed expenditure on salaries and pensions).
We genuflect before the position. We call it the “House of the People.” And then… then the Governor hosts orientation programs for national youth festivals while our most fundamental demands—ILP to protect our land from demographic invasion, 8th Schedule status to preserve our mother tongue—gather dust in Delhi’s corridors.
It’s like the Grand Inquisitor’s reproach to Christ in The Brothers Karamazov—we’ve built magnificent structures and elaborate rituals, but somewhere along the way, we forgot what they were actually for.
The Mathematics of Neglect:
Let’s talk numbers. Not because numbers tell the whole truth but because they reveal patterns—
Umberto Eco taught us to be suspicious of anyone who claims complete truth. Meghalaya’s total estimated expenditure for 2025-26 is ₹30,003 crore. Revenue expenditure is ₹20,556 crore. A three-fold increase over eight years! Impressive growth. Yet ILP? Still pending. 8th Schedule? Still pending. The Governor’s special constitutional powers to push these demands? Still dormant.
The Khasi Authors’ Society president said it plainly: “We have not received any information on when the Eighth Schedule will be amended”. After forty years. After countless resolutions. After the state government granted “associate official language status” to Khasi in 2005—a half-measure that satisfied no one.
The Political Economy of Indifference:
We need to examine something uncomfortable here. The Governor’s position costs us money—how much exactly, the budget documents don’t specify in convenient line items, but Raj Bhavan doesn’t run on good wishes. Staff salaries, maintenance, security, vehicles, official functions… it all adds up. And what’s our return on investment? Youth orientation programs? Ceremonial meetings with carefully selected delegates? Statements about how “leadership is not about power, but about empowerment?”
Meanwhile, as MP Syngkon pointed out in December 2025, these issues require “political unity” and sustained pressure on the Centre. The Chief Minister engages. The MPs engage. Civil society organizations like the Hynniewtrep Youth Council, Jaintia National Council, and Confederation of Ri Bhoi People keep submitting memoranda but the one constitutional office specifically empowered to be our tribal advocate – our Governor, who could invoke special provisions, who could submit detailed reports to the President, who could make regulations under the Fifth Schedule? That office remains… comfortable. Silent. Ceremonial.
What “Lok” and What “Bhavan?”
So we return to the name. Lok Bhavan. The People’s House. Orwell wrote in “Politics and the English Language” that political language “is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.” Harsh words. But are they wrong here? When a “People’s House” is practically inaccessible to people without political connections… when a position meant to protect tribal interests presides over their neglect… when “doors are open” but the doorkeeper remains vigilant… what do we actually have?
We have a palace. We have pageantry. We have photo opportunities and inspirational quotes. What we don’t have is advocacy where it matters most. We don’t have someone using their constitutional authority to push the Centre on ILP. We don’t have someone making regulations to protect our demographic character. We don’t have someone filing those detailed reports to the President that could actually move the needle.
The Question We Must Ask:
As concerned citizens of Meghalaya, we’re left with a simple, brutal question: What exactly is the Governor doing for us? Not for selected youth contingents. Not for carefully curated orientation programs. But for us! For the ILP that would protect our land. For the 8th Schedule recognition that would preserve our language. For the major issues—the ones that will determine whether our children and grandchildren inherit a Meghalaya that still belongs to its indigenous people or one where we’ve been rendered strangers in our own home.
The Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulations of 1873 protects four northeastern states through ILP. Meghalaya wants in. The 8th Schedule of the Constitution recognizes 22 languages. Khasi, spoken by lakhs, waits outside. These aren’t radical demands. These are survival imperatives.
And our Governor? Our constitutional guardian remains ensconced in Lok Bhavan, that beautiful misnomer on the hill, while the actual “lok”—the people—wonder if we’ll ever reclaim what was always supposed to be ours.
(The writer is an Advocate, Trade Unionist & Ethicist)
