Shillong, Aug 26: After a week of highway blockades, arrests and empty hotels, peace finally got a chance this evening when Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma and the Khasi Students Union sat across the table at the Meghalaya Secretariat at 6 pm in what both sides described as a positive and frank meeting.
The high-level talks, attended by the Chief Secretary, DGP and Home Department officials along with the full KSU Central Executive Committee, came after the government formally invited KSU to discuss its five-point charter following the violent August 19 Black Flag bike rally and subsequent blocking of Meghalaya vehicles in Assam.
KSU pressed for cancellation of the July 31 public hearing for Shree Cement’s limestone project at Lum Syrman in East Jaintia Hills, suspension of the DC, SP and MSPCB officials, full implementation of MRSSA 2016 with facilitation centres at all 18 entry points in Khasi-Jaintia Hills pending ILP, strict enforcement of the amended Migrant Workmen Act 2020, reforms in NEIGRIHMS recruitment including 80:20 male-female ratio and indigenous reservation, and a complete revamp of MPSC and DSC recruitment SOPs.
Sources said the Chief Minister assured that work on MRSSA facilitation centres and migrant regulation is being expedited and that alleged irregularities in the East Jaintia hearing will be examined, while making it clear that law will take its own course on the arrests of KSU president Raymond Kharjana, vice president Pynkmenlang Sanmiet, general secretary Reuben Najiar and others under MMPO and MPDA.
Both sides agreed that normalcy must return immediately as Meghalaya’s tourism economy has been hit hard with nearly 80 percent cancellations affecting not only hotels and homestays but poor tribal families dependent on tourism, with highways wearing a deserted look yesterday, and that if NGOs have grievances they must be taken up with the government and not by targeting innocent tourists and commuters.
The government reiterated that the SIT probe into the August 19 violence, including five masked agitators, will continue even as dialogue proceeds, and another round of talks is expected after KSU consults its units, but tonight’s meeting has for now broken the deadlock.
