The Meghalaya State Human Rights Commission was created to address issues of human rights violations in this state and the inability of ordinary citizens to access the rights guaranteed under the Indian Constitution. But like every other institution this one too goes down the way of disuse. People continue to die in the illegally operated coal mines of the state particularly in Jaintia Hills but the State Human Rights Commission is oblivious of all these evils carrying on under the very nose of the government and law keepers. The recent deaths at Ichamati have now turned into a slanging match between the group that feels victimised and the several custodians of the rights of tribal communities. Meanwhile the “suspected” killers remain at large and going by our past sordid history in law enforcement it is highly unlikely that the killers will ever be nabbed. This will be yet another forgotten bloody saga. Those who know the killers will not bleat and those killers lay in wait for the next victim. This is part of Meghalaya’s dark history which is not recorded in its 50-year historic annals as it would not sit well with readers worldwide. In fact, every document about Meghalaya in these last 50 years are euphoric plaudits for successive governments and nothing about the myriad acts of corruption that have marred the progress of the state.
Institutions such as the Human Rights Commission or the Lok Adalat are created for the public to access justice and rights but they soon become a secretariat with employees paid by the state and little accountability. They only have annual celebrations to tell the world they exist and then it’s back to business as usual with no accountability whatsoever. The State Human Rights Commission is expected to take suo-moto action when the state is complacent in its duties; more so when there are targeted killings and the state is absent from duty or takes the deaths as mere statistics.
Institutions tend to suffer from a status quoist syndrome where files are perused and signatures appended as a rigmarole with no thought or feelings invested in the whole process. When humanity is absent from those presiding over institutions that are created to safeguard the rights of all citizens and not just the privileged few, then the entire functioning of such institutions is futile. Institutional leadership is the key to making the institution and its human resource responsive to peoples’ needs because it exists primarily to serve people and to address their lack of access to rights, especially the right to life which appears to be taken lightly in this State.
