Shillong,June 19: The state government has sought suggestions from three autonomous district councils (ADCs) to have uniformity in issuing Scheduled Tribe (ST) certificate in Meghalaya.
The deputy chief minister in-charge district council affairs (DCA) Prestone Tynsong on Wednesday chaired a meeting in this regard in presence of social welfare minister Paul Lyngdoh and representatives from the three ADCs – KHADC, JHADC and GHADC.
Paul Lyngdoh said, “The meeting was held in the context of the issue of ST certificate and the Lineage Act 1997 passed by the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council (KHADC). Today’s meeting convened at the level of deputy chief minister in-charge DCA was held because we felt the need to have uniformity in the approach to the subject of issuance of ST and clan certificate that should be broad based and to include the entire state of Meghalaya.”
“This is because the Office Memorandum (OM) issued by the Social Welfare department was confined to the Act of the KHADC. Therefore, we thought it prudent to make it more broad based and include the other two district councils – JHADC and GHADC,” he said
The JHADC is yet to frame its own Lineage Act while the GHADC is in the process of framing the Act.
Lyngdoh said it was decided that the next meeting will be taken at his level as chairman of the committee that would elicit and solicit the opinion of the three ADCs and will also include the DCA department and the law department to study the suggestions and inputs from all the three ADCs.
“Once we receive their comments, we can come up with a notification or OM that covers the issue of ST certificates for the entire state of Meghalaya,” he said.
