Tura, July 17: Deputy Commissioner of West Garo Hills, Jagdish Chelani, has informed that Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma will be coming to Tura next week and will be interacting with the members of ACHIK, who have been on hunger strike for the last 7 days. In light of this, he has urged the organization to call off the hunger strike immediately.
The DC visited the agitation camp, which is set up opposite the mini-secretariat, on Monday and interacted with the protestors, who have two major demands – the winter capital in Tura and retrospective implementation of the reservation roster.
He said the protestors want the personal intervention of the Chief Minister into the matter and assurances.
“We have been closely observing the event as to how the strike has been going on. We have been taking stock of their health… what kind of activities going on… During the course of the event, we have been continuously monitoring and personally interacting with the Hon’ble CM sir, Dy CM Sir, and giving him updates about the event. Hon’ble CM sir has personally said that he will visiting Tura next week and interacting with the group to understand their demands,” Chelani said after meeting with the protestors.
“They are demanding the winter capital establishment in Tura and for the retrospective implementation of the reservation roster. Not in a single go (implementation of roster system) but probably in an EMI model of a sort where it can be turned in a staggered manner over a period of time to capture what has been lost the previous years,” he added.
Mentionably, the government has issued an office memorandum through which it has effectively stated that the roster system will be implemented prospectively. At the same time, a specific committee has been set up which will have experts from the field of legal, law, economics, constitution, which will take that call after discussion with different groups. Additionally, a political committee under Health Minister Ampareen Lyngdoh has also been set up taking into consideration all the different political groups to discuss the matter of State job Reservation policy.
“At the point in time, the group also ascertains that they would like the CM Sir to come in person and have a discussion with them, and be able to alleviate what concerns they have, give assurances on his part of looking into the matter and be able to resolve it at the earliest possible. What they have been demanding at lot at this point in time is an audience with the CM, which at this point shouldn’t be a cause of concern. The primary purpose of the group was to take up this matter at administrative and political level, which has been done successfully,” the DC said.
Given that the group has achieved much of its objectives, he urged them to call of their hunger strike. If they continue with the protest, he called it an arm-twisting mechanism
“I earnestly request them to, very fervently, that they should take off the hunger strike. Otherwise, it is an arm-twisting mechanism. Their setting demonstration itself is a strong tool for the government to recognise if there has been any issues or any concerns by the public. At the point, we don’t want any group to be following similar procedure or mechanism,” he said.
Also read: Load Shedding in Shillong, Tura and Jowai to be reduced to 2 hrs, 5 hrs for rest of Meghalaya
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