Shillong, Dec 12: The Voice of the People Party (VPP) has blamed both the ruling and the opposition for diluting the demand to implement the Inner Line Permit (ILP) in the state.
The successive governments are not in favour of implementing the ILP in Meghalaya, VPP spokesperson Dr Batskhem Myrboh told reporters.
“The Congress from 2013 till 2018 had maintained that ILP is outdated, the United Democratic Party (UDP) said that they want a modified ILP while the National People’s Party (NPP) was not in agreement with the ILP demand. However, it is only when the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) was passed by the Centre, these political parties may be because of political reasons are now saying Meghalaya needs ILP,” Dr Myrboh said.
“But sadly, the former stand of these political parties has weakened the demand for implementation of the ILP because they have always maintained that it was just a demand made by the pressure groups and not the state. Therefore, the Centre is taking advantage of the situation,” he said.
The VPP leader criticised the state government’s decision to amend the Eastern Bengal Frontier Regulation, 1873 by deleting the districts of Khasi Jaintia Hills from the Preamble of the Regulation in 2019, and said, “This was a big blunder made by the political parties in the government and has further made the ILP issue more difficult.”
He, however, assured that the VPP will try its best to find ways and means to ensure Meghalaya is again brought under the purview of the ILP regulation.”
To a question on the Centre’s delay to examine the ILP resolution passed by the State Assembly in 2019, Dr Myrboh said “Since 2019 till now, it is already three years – this means the answer is no from the Centre. I don’t think the BJP is serious. Until and unless there is strong pressure from the state and the unanimous decision of all political parties to demand ILP, the Centre doesn’t really favour ILP.”
“Why Manipur got ILP, it is because right from 2015, the political parties out there irrespective of what ideology they follow, they, including BJP, all supported ILP. The BJP in Meghalaya in the past years never supported ILP, the Congress in Meghalaya also never supported ILP but in Manipur it supports the ILP. Further, in Manipur, there is political unanimity on the need for ILP but here in Meghalaya there is political unanimity not to implement ILP. If ILP is implemented, it should be modified one,” he said.
“Therefore, the demand for ILP has been weakened in Meghalaya and the BJP here just changed its stand after the passing of the CAA,” he said.
Asserting that linking ILP and CAA is pointless, Dr Myrboh said this is because CAA is already exempted from the Sixth Schedule areas meaning nearly the whole of Meghalaya except the normal areas, the CAA is not exempted.
“All political parties before passing CAA, they say no ILP, but just after passing of the CAA, they say ILP is needed but CAA has been exempted from Meghalaya so on what ground they are justifying their stand and I don’t think the Centre is a fool will go with the unstable stand of the Meghalaya. I will tell you the demand for ILP has been weakened by all political parties,” he added.
