The Garo Hills in Meghalaya has produced four chief ministers who have ruled the state for the longest possible time. The Khasi-Jaintia Hills have had seven chief ministers but none of them could ever complete their terms due to infighting and political instability. Captain Williamson Sangma was Meghalaya’s first chief minister after the birth of the new state in 1972. He was then a member of the All Party Hills Leaders’ Conference, which led the demand for a separate state to be carved out of Assam for the Khasi, Jaintia and Garo people.
What precipitated the statehood demand was the imposition of the Assamese language as the lingua franca of the then undivided Assam. In 1976, a faction of the APHLC, led by Capt Sangma merged with the Congress after the APHLC’s Mendipathar conference. This new merger helped the Congress establish its foothold in Meghalaya, at a time when the tribals were dead against the national party.
Capt Sangma had the foresight and wanted to develop the Garo Hills, which was much lesser developed than the Khasi-Jaintia Hills. He began by starting a thermal project in Nanglabibra in the south Garo Hills. But this was an idea whose time had not come. The project failed due to communication bottlenecks and the inability to transport machinery. But Capt Sangma made sure the Meghalaya Board of School Education, which he considered to be of prime importance, was located in the Garo Hills.
So while the Khasi and Jaintia Hills produced seven CMs, the Garo Hills has produced four and the fifth one is now in the hot seat. Hence Meghalaya has had 12 CMs while this is only the 10th Legislature. And there has been such a churning in Meghalaya since its inception that only three chief ministers could complete their full terms and all three are from the Garo Hills. They are Capt Sangma, Salseng Marak and Mukul Sangma, who has just demitted office.
The fractured mandate this time came largely from the Khasi-Jaintia Hills, which had at least four regional parties contesting the polls while in the Garo Hills the fight was only between the National People’s Party and the Congress. Garo votes have always been consolidated by the Congress or by a national party like the Nationalist Congress Party, which PA Sangma, former Speaker of the Lok Sabha, had co-founded.
Indeed the backlog of development in the Garo Hills is shocking. The most visible non-starter is the Baljek airport conceived in the 1990s. There is a helicopter service between Shillong and Tura, which operates three times a week. And only recently was the 261 km Shillong-Nongstoin- Rongjeng-Tura, two-laned National Highway 127 B, inaugurated by Prime Minister Modi in December 2017. Earlier the first railway line to Mendipathar from Guwahati was also inaugurated by Modi in 2016. In terms of connectivity, therefore, the Garo Hills seems to have received a boost only after the NDA Government came to power in Delhi.
What is baffling is the non-operational Baljek Airport at Tura, the construction for which started in 1995. It was inaugurated by President Pratibha Patil in 2008. The airport, built at a cost of Rs 12.52 crore then, was initially designed to handle 20-seater aircrafts like the Dornier Do 228. The Baljek Airport, however, remained non-functional because it was conceived as a Short Taking Off and Landing airport with a runway of around 1,120 metres capable of handling only small aircrafts and hence is no longer operational.
This is called shortsightedness in planning. The state government has been trying to expand the runway for handling larger aircrafts like ATR 72 (50 to 60 seaters). But the matter is hanging fire. However, the process of handing over Baljek airport to the Airport Authority of India is being considered. The detailed project report for operationalisation of Baljek Airport for ATR 72 type of aircraft was received back in 2010 from RITES, but the files have not moved at the desired pace. But this has been the norm rather than the exception with all projects in Meghalaya and the Garo Hills in particular.
For the people of the Garo Hills, travelling by road for more than 200 km to reach Guwahati airport and then to take a flight to other parts of the country, is very taxing. A functioning Baljek airport would have solved many travel problems but it appears that this airport is jinxed. Even the formidable PA Sangma as Union Minister could not get it to take off. We are told that the runway is too short for taking off and landing of any commercial flight. Acquisition of land for expansion of runway is necessary but when land belongs to communities getting hold of such land is a major hindrance.
And considering that everyday people from this region are travelling to other parts of the country by air for various purposes like education, medical treatment, business, shopping et al, it is unfortunate that air travel from the Garo Hills still remains a distant dream.
The Baljek airport if made operational, would have served the internal communication needs of not just the people of the Garo Hills but also other parts of Meghalaya like Nongstoin, Riangdo, Shahlang, including the adjoining Mankachar, Goalpara, Krishnai and Dudhnoi towns of Assam and hence the operation of flights from this remote town of Meghalaya to important cities of the country like Guwahati, Kolkata, Delhi, Chennai, Bangalore by commercial flights like Jet airways, Indigo, Spice Jet would have been financially viable apart from boosting the economic condition of the people of this area.
During Capt Sangma’s time, the Meghalaya Bamboo Chips industry was set up at Nongshram near Rongjeng. This project suffered from the same problems as the thermal project at Nangalbibra. It was located at a place that was in the back of beyond and if some small fault developed with the machine it took one week to get it repaired since the spare parts had to be brought in from Assam by road. The project became non-viable and was closed down, leaving many employees high and dry.
Hence, although Capt Sangma tried his best to bring in developmental projects to the Garo Hills, he tried to locate them closer to his constituency at Baghmara (now the headquarters of South Garo Hills) which is still very underdeveloped. The most developed constituency today is Ampati, in the South West Garo Hills district, which is also former chief minister Mukul Sangma’s pocket borough. He has created a state of the art stadium, health centre and several development projects. In fact Mukul Sangma has been accused of pulling all important projects to the Garo Hills. But no one can fault him on this! The Garo Hills continues to remain distant and unreached. South Garo Hills in particular remains the same as it was 20 years ago. The lack of monitoring of government extension programmes and field visits by officers has only compounded the problem.
Also, another concern is that once the MLAs from the Garo Hills are elected they all want to own homes in Shillong, the state capital and only rarely visit their constituencies. Hence they miss out the key development needs of their people. The absence of an integrated planning mechanism, which looks at the needs of the state in a holistic manner and bridges the developmental gaps in regions and districts that are most neglected, is absent.
Meghalaya has functioned without a policy in primary areas of development and so there is no economic roadmap. In 1994, the Meghalaya Economic Development Council was created by an act of the Assembly. It was meant to provide a focused economic development paradigm that would not be subject to political vagaries but would look at the needs of the state, irrespective of which party comes to power. Unfortunately, the politicians failed to recognise the importance of this body and turned it into a cemetery for failed politicians thereby killing the very idea for which this body was meant.
This time again, the CM, Conrad Sangma, is from the Garo Hills but he is more far-sighted despite his age. He has been Finance Minister for a short period in 2008-09. It is hoped that like his father PA Sangma, he will adopt new development templates that will focus on rural Meghalaya while taking care of the smart cities programme.
What could also speed up development is the waning of militant activities in the Garo Hills with the death of the GNLA chief Sohan Shira recently and the surrender of his key cadres.
We can only wait and watch and keep our fingers crossed.
The writer is Editor of the Shillong Times and can be contacted at patricia.mukhim@gmail.com