The sealing of the Shillong Peak Ropeway site at Madan Laban is not about one company forgetting one licence. It is a collision of three legitimate authorities that have been operating past each other.
On one side is the KHADC. The Council’s argument is procedural but not trivial. Under the Sixth Schedule, a trading licence is not a formality; it is the mechanism by which the Council asserts its mandate to regulate non-tribal commercial activity in its jurisdiction. Two show-cause notices since May, followed by an assurance of compliance that never came, gave the Council both reason and precedent to act. If the Council looks away here, it weakens its own regulatory power for every outside company that comes after.
On the other side is the State Tourism Department. From its perspective, this is a government project on government land, intended as public infrastructure for tourism. To have a Council inspector seal a government camp site — and to then face an FIR — is seen as an overreach and a law-and-order issue. The government cannot be seen to need permission to build on its own property.
On the third side, and arguably the most important, is the Dorbar and the Hima. The JAC’s question is fundamental. Who gave the Rangbah Shnong the right to lease the Viewpoint at all? In the Khasi system, a sanad is a trust to protect and manage, not a title to transact. If community land is leased without the informed consent of the Dorbar Pyllun, even a perfectly licensed project lacks social legitimacy.
All three can be right at the same time, and that is the problem.
The Trading Licence issue can be resolved on paper — produce the NOC, apply, get the licence. The deeper knot cannot. Was community consent taken before the lease was signed? Was the distinction between custodian and owner explained and respected? Was there a single table where KHADC, Hima Mylliem, Riat Laban Dorbar Pyllun, and the Tourism Department were all present before construction began?
Development in the Khasi Hills has always required two clearances, legal and social. One without the other does not hold.
The way forward is not an FIR against an inspector or a counter-sealing. It is to pause and do what should have been done at the start. Place the lease deed, the sanad, and the land records before the Dorbar Pyllun, get the trading licence file completed transparently, and let the Hima clarify the scope of the Rangbah Shnong’s authority in writing.
A ropeway is meant to connect two points. Right now, it is exposing how disconnected our own institutions are.
