United Democratic Party (UDP) leader Paul Lyngdoh informed today that the party has yet to sit and discuss the issue of alleged illegal coal mining in the state.
“We need to debate on the pieces of evidence of where and who are carrying out the illegal collections and who are the beneficiaries from these illegal collections of coal,” he told Highland Post.
The Jaiaw MDC said that he is ready to act decisively on this cause and the UDP cannot sit back and allow illegalities to take place at will in Meghalaya. The UDP is part of the Meghalaya Democratic Alliance coalition government.
The opposition Congress Party has, on several occasions, criticized what it terms the silence on the part of regional parties like the UDP on the issue.
However, Lyngdoh said that if the people want regional parties to do more on this or other issues, such as electricity supply and the price of petrol – two other issues that have been at the fore recently – the public need to elect more representatives from the regional parties.
“We want to see a strong and progressive government that is determined and has a sense of direction and takes decisions accordingly,” Lyngdoh said. “The problem with our people is that they clap and celebrate two-three months after the election results and then onwards strike their foreheads in remorse. Governments do not fall from the sky but are created and elected by the people themselves.”
He rejected the argument that regional parties have limited influence outside Meghalaya’s borders, saying that UDP founder EK Mawlong had led the way in negotiating with Assam on the disputed border region.
Fellow UDP leader, Bindo Lanong, meanwhile, blamed the central government, led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), for high fuel taxes.
“It is surprising that the BJP government at the centre has imposed an extra burden on the people of the country by imposing exorbitant taxes, including the fuel tax, when the people are already burdened by the Covid-19 pandemic,” he said.
The states then followed, Lanong added, with the Meghalaya government superseding this fuel tax until there were strikes and a public outcry.
“Our government has to be farsighted before implementing any laws or taxes to ensure that it will not affect the public to the extent that they resort to strikes and agitations. The government should also have the ability to justify on what grounds the taxes were imposed so that the public is not confused,” he said.
The former cabinet minister also lambasted what he said is the government’s failure in the power sector, for which he identified corruption as the cause.
“The UDP along with the HSPDP (Hill State People’s Democratic Party, an ally of the UDP) has spoken out from time to time on the various issues, including coal, railways, encroachment by Assam, etc with the government and is not silent and it’s a false perception of the people that we are silent,” Lanong said while also blaming the people for not giving a full mandate to the regional parties.
“The people have made a bad decision by not giving the regional parties a chance to govern and when people take a wrong decision it is them who will ultimately suffer,” he said.
