Shillong, Dec 23: Kyrsoibor Pyrtuh,
Member, State Level Monitoring Committee on Shelter for Urban Homeless has urged the monitoring committee state chief to address the plight of homeless people during winter.
In a letter addressed to K W Marbaniang, the. Chairman, State Level Monitoring Committee, Pyrtuh said it pains him to see that there are homeless people who are sleeping on the pavements, parking areas, open spaces across the city.
“Today evening, between 8.10 pm and 8.30 pm, there were two middle aged male persons sleeping infront of the parking area at Pantaloons, Assam Auto Petrol Pump, Jowai Road.This is happening despite the repeated directives to States and Union Territories, by the Supreme Court of India”, Pyrtuh said.
In the recent past, Meghalaya government had also constituted the State Monitoring Committee for Shelter of Urban Homeless comprising different members, which include members of the civil society.
Subsequent to the constitution of the committee several meetings were held. But of late no meetings have been called except when the State has to file the report to the Union Ministry and the last meeting was called on December 12, 2024 only to make members to concur to the report which had to be submitted to the Union Ministry.
“In this regard, I strongly express my dissatisfaction on the inaction of the Urban Affairs of the Government of Meghalaya.
Therefore, I want to place on record and submit the following that Shillong is now recording between 8 to 4 degree celcius and this will continue till January. It is also anticipated that there will be nights that the temperature might dip to between 2 to 0 degree celcius.Therefore, I strongly urge the Urban Affairs/Shillong Municipality to kindly prepare immediate action plan within a day or two on how to address this issue of homelessness”, he said.
“I want to state here that I myself will be touring every evening across the city to physically verify the prevalence of homeless people. That if the Urban Authority of the State fails to prepare a plan of action and take immediate steps, I shall have to prepare a seperate report to be sent to the Union Ministry with a copy to the Supreme Court”, Pyrtuh said.
