Once again, the contentious issue of railways is back at the forefront of discussion.
In Meghalaya the issue is controversial only because certain pressure groups have made it so. They have dangled the bogeyman of influx in front of the public and have supposedly swayed the people into believing that railways equal a flood of migrants. Supposedly swayed because there is no way of knowing the public’s true feelings and whether they have bought the anti-rail argument or not.
The opposition is centred in Khasi-Jaintia Hills and this is a major obstacle to the central government’s vision to connect every state capital to the national rail network.
On the other hand, Garo Hills has been more forthcoming, with Meghalaya’s only functioning railway line running up to Mendipathar in North Garo Hills. That represents just a toehold in the state but it is a start. And now, MLAs from South Garo Hills have expressed willingness for the network to extend to their district too.
Pressure groups in Khasi-Jaintia Hills hold out the possibility of railways if the central government implements the Inner Line Permit in Meghalaya, something New Delhi seems unlikely to do at present.
The intimidatory tactics employed by many pressure groups mean that the government is equally unlikely to defy them and introduce railways over their heads. Yet the anti-railways arguments are weak. Opponents claim a flood of migrants will land up in Meghalaya if railways come. Has Garo Hills suffered this fate? It is admittedly hard to tell without statistics but there has been no large-scale pushback yet. A migrant so determined to reach Meghalaya would surely find alternative ways into the state in the absence of a train service.
The shrill rhetoric against railways also implies that Meghalaya is teeming with jobs that these hypothetical migrants could take (it isn’t) and that the state doesn’t already have mechanisms to make things difficult for migrants (it does). In fact, there are umpteen laws and regulations on paper that should act as a deterrent – the Land Transfer Act, Benami Act, need for labour and/or trading licences, state job reservation policy, etc.
The fact is that there are numerous laws that the state and district councils could call upon to keep a check on rampant migration but they aren’t used effectively. ILP, if ever introduced, would probably go the same way.
On the other hand are the arguments for rail – cheaper transport costs for passengers and freight, being better for the environment than trucks, buses and taxis, helping to alleviate pressure on the state’s clogged highways. But however real these benefits might be, when it comes to railways Meghalaya has so far been governed by emotion, not logic.
