Meghalaya: Congress demands special session in KHADC over amendment to Sixth Schedule
SHILLONG | Nov 2, 2019:
The opposition Congress in the KHADC today demanded the UDP-led Executive Committee (EC) to convene a special session to deliberate on the amendments to the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution.
"We would want the EC to convene a special session to discuss on the proposed amendment," Congress MDC from Mawhati constituency, Charles Marngar told reporters here today.
According to him, they are demanding for the special session as they are unhappy with the decision of the committee set up by the State Government stating that the changes made in the recommendations submitted to the Parliamentary Standing Committee were made without the knowledge of the stakeholders.
"The stakeholders had proposed that the number of seats should be increase to 31 which will include two nominated women members. Despite this, the State Government in its report to the Parliament standing committee recommended that the seats should be increased to 40," he said. It may be mentioned that the current strength of seats in the KHADC is 30 with one nominated member.
ALSO WATCH:
"We are concerned since the committee set up by the Government might have made changes in it's report submitted to the standing committee on many of the contentious issues," he said. The Congress MDC from Mawhati said that the committee might have made changes to others proposals too especially the contentious "unrepresented tribes" issue.
Earlier, the state government-constituted committee headed by the district council affairs minister James K Sangma had decided to recommend deletion of the word "unrepresented tribes" from the proposed amendment of the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution of India.
Meanwhile, Marngar said that they are also not happy over the decision to send two representatives from the KHADC, to attend the meeting convened by the Ministry of Home Affairs, without any prior consultation with other MDCs of the council.
"Was this decision to send these two MDCs taken up by the Executive Committee or in the United Democratic Alliance?" Margnar asked even as he added that the Congress MDCs were not informed of the proposed meeting at New Delhi.
ALSO WATCH:
The opposition Congress said that the letter sent by the Ministry to the Chief Secretary of the state clearly mentions that authorities of the autonomous district councils under the Sixth Schedule areas and other stakeholders should be informed of the proposed meeting.
It may be mentioned that on October 30, the Ministry of Home Affairs held a meeting to hear the views of the various autonomous district councils and other stakeholders of Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram, on the proposed amendments to the Sixth Schedule.
Margnar informed that two MDCs who represented the KHADC were – Chief Executive Member, Teinwell Dkhar and nominated member Bindo M Lanong.
Margnar also alleged that the Congress MDCs were also not consulted on the 15-point questionnaires put up by the Ministry of Home Affairs.
