Pyndapborthiaw Saibon re-elected as KHNAM president, terms MDA as a Govt of Resolutions and Committees

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaJune 4, 2023

Pyndapborthiaw Saibon has been re-elected as president of the Khun Hynniewtrep National Awakening Movement (KHNAM).

The general council meeting of the KHNAM held on Saturday also elected Thomas Passah as the working president, M Marpna as vice president and James A Neng as general secretary besides the other office bearers and executive members for the term 2023-2026.

Issues related to the demand for implementation of the Inner Line Permit (ILP), inclusion of Khasi language in the Eighth Schedule, border dispute, influx, rise in corruption, separate cadre system for Meghalaya and others were also discussed during the meeting.

Addressing media persons, newly elected working president Thomas Passah slammed the Meghalaya Democratic Alliance government for knowing only how to pass resolutions and form committees instead of coming up with solutions to address the issues confronting the state.

“It seems we have a government who is a big fan of resolution and committee but zero in solution to the problems that the state is facing all this time,” he said while adding that the resolutions on ILP and Khasi language remain just as resolutions till today and committees constituted to relocate the Sweepers’ Colony and to investigate into the killing of former HNLC leader Cheristerfield Thangkhiew are also taking too long.  

Stating that the party does not want any delay in the report of the recently constituted expert committee for reviewing the state reservation policy (SRP), Passah said, “We have had a meeting last time, we were not in agreement to have an expert committee but however expert committee has been constituted but our stand is very simple, we have point down specific amendments in the SRP 1972 which are legally strong and logically required.”

He said the party  is also demanding the state government to arrange a debate with the expert committee on the legality of the party’s recommendation for amendment.

“As per statement of the chairperson of the committee on reservation policy we were told that we would not have experts from the state of Meghalaya, experts would be called from outside, this bring doubts into our minds whether the demand to amend the SRP 1972 would be fulfil or not,” Passah said while informing that the party would be writing to the government to include intellectuals from the state to be members of the expert committee.

The KHNAM has demanded that the word “autonomous” from Para 1 and Para 1 (a) & (b) of the SRP dated January 12, 1972 which provide for 40% of reservation each for Khasi-Jaintia & Garo be deleted and “Reservation is workout based on the population structure of the Khasi-Jaintia and Garo communities respectively or 80% combined reservation be made in favour of all communities of the State (Khasi, Jaintia and Garo) which is to be filled on merit basis for administrative efficiency.”

It pointed out that as per the census of 2011 the Khasi & Jaintia communities have excess population of 5,78,918 to those of the Garo communities and this difference is projected to rise to 9,49,756 after the completion of census 2021.

Therefore, the projected difference in population needs to be taken into consideration while working out the percentage of reservation.

The party further asserted that Para 2 of the SRP dated January 12, 1972 needs to be amended by deleting the provision of carrying forward of vacancies. It is noted that carrying forward of vacancies is against the core objective of the policy namely “administrative efficiency” as mentioned in Para 1 of the Resolution. Therefore, after the sentence “then such vacancies will be available to others, the rest of the Para 2 of the Resolution be deleted in Toto.

It said that the OM dated December 18, 1972 provides for reservation to the District level posts at the district level where the incumbents are not likely to be transferred outside the district of original posting, there will be a combined reservation of 80% of the posts in favour of Garos, Khasi-Jaintias instead of a separate reservation of 40% each for Garos and Khasi-Jaintias.

“The same need to be amended to clearly indicate that “In district level post where the incumbents are not likely to be transferred outside the district of original posting, 80% reservation is to be made in favour of Khasi-Jaintias in Khasi and Jaintia Hills District and 80% reservation is to be made in favour of Garos in Garo Hills District,” the party said.

Further, the KHNAM also said the OM dated May 28, 1974 the vacancies reserved to the Garos are being made available to person who are not Garo, but merely conversant in Garo languages, customs and usages adding “This provision needs to be deleted and the vacancies reserved for Garo communities needs to be filled up only by the Garos.”

“The OM dated May 28, 1974 the vacancies reserved to the Garos are being made available to candidates who are from outside the state of Meghalaya, this provision needs to be deleted,” it added.

Meanwhile, the KHNAM also decided to send a representation and a strong demand to the government of Meghalaya to do away with the joint cadre with Assam as it affects the functioning of the state of Meghalaya on various levels be it boundary dispute and other related subjects.

“Our strong view is that the joint cadre system should be done away with and if we have to do a joint cadre, we prefer to have a joint cadre with other states like Mizoram, Nagaland but not with Assam,” Passah added.