SHILLONG, Feb 1: Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader Ronnie V Lyngdoh said on Thursday that the party’s state unit will follow the AICC’s directive on seat sharing with the TMC.
“As of right now, we have finalised the candidates for the parliamentary seats in Shillong and Tura. When the AICC leaders attended the screening committee meeting in Guwahati recently to finalise the candidates for the two seats, there was no mention of seat sharing,” Lyngdoh said while responding to a question about whether the MPCC would consent to let the TMC submit candidates from the Tura Parliamentary seat in accordance with the opposition INDIA bloc’s sharing talks.
It should be noted that the Congress has finalised Saleng A Sangma as its candidate for the Tura parliamentary seat, and sitting Lok Sabha member Vincent H Pala from the Shillong seat.
He made it clear that the Congress will not take any of the contesting candidates from other parties lightly.
“Winning both parliamentary seats is our main goal,” he declared and added that the party would reach out to the public to tell them that in order for them to choose the MP who will represent the Hynniewtrep community in the Parliament they must adopt a new perspective. “The elections for the Assembly or district councils are entirely distinct from the Lok Sabha elections,” according to Lyngdoh.
He claimed that the current political climate in the country is unhealthy since the ruling BJP is attempting to violate the rights of the tribal community.
He claims that the nation’s democracy and secularism are under attack.
The CLP leader claimed that those who criticise the government are not spared and the central agencies harass them and suppress their voices.
He claims that they have also seen firsthand how the NDA Government does not spare the chief ministers who oppose the ruling party in the Centre.
“We have seen how the Jharkhand Chief Minister (Hemant Soren) was placed behind bars. As the elections get closer, I have no doubt that many more chief ministers who don’t back the BJP government will suffer the same fate. Even in the last Parliamentary elections, this was the pattern,” he claimed.
The CLP leader claimed that this was the first time in the history of the country that 145 MPs had been suspended overall and that this had allowed the BJP government in power at the Centre to pass numerous bills with no opposition input.
He claims that this poses a serious threat to the democratic system of the country.
