SHILLONG, July 2: The new NPP-led Executive Committee (EC) in the KHADC will reexamine the need to reconstitute the special panel to examine the possibility of opening up the Dorbar Shnong for women.
The previous UDP-led EC had constituted a special panel to examine the matter. This was the first such initiative taken by the KHADC to deliberate on this issue.
The committee, constituted in April this year, is headed by former CEM and now Opposition leader, Titosstarwell Chyne. Grace Mary Kharpuri and Macdalyne Mawlong, the two women members of the KHADC, are also part of this panel. The committee was supposed to prepare its report in two months.
However, the panel did not hold even a single meeting after it was constituted.
The decision to constitute the special committee was taken after the Lympung Ki Seng Kynthei (LKSK), an apex body of 28 women’s organisations from East Khasi Hills District, had approached the KHADC demanding a separate legislation empowering women to take part in the affairs and functioning of the Dorbar Shnong.
Members of the LKSK, led its president Theilin Phanbuh, had met the then CEM, Titosstarwell Chyne and submitted a memorandum highlighting their demand that women should be legally permitted to take part in the affairs of the Dorbar Shnong and also contest elections.
“Women should be party in any decision to ensure the smooth functioning of the Dorbar Shnong. It will also allow all the residents including women and men to be part of the decision making process,” LKSK had said.
Traditionally, women are not allowed to partake in the affairs of the Dorbar Shnong but Lympung Ki Seng Kynthei is of the opinion that time is ripe for traditions to be changed so that women are allowed to participate in the functioning of the Dorbar and also permitted to contest elections to the traditional body.
