Pro-Inner Line Permit groups announce fresh blockades

With the state government keen on implementing the Tenancy Act, 14 pro-Inner Line Permit groups in Meghalaya announced fresh night road blockades to demand implementation of the ILP to check illegal influx into the state.
The three night road blockade beginning from November 5 will be effective in the entire state from 8 PM to 5 AM, Khasi Students' Union (KSU) president Daniel Khyriem said in a statement issued here.
The leader of the influential students organisation in the state said the NGOs were left with no option but to "protest" due to the "adamant attitude" and failure of the Congress-led government to implement the Eastern Bengal Frontier Regulation Act 1873 or Inner Line Permit (ILP) which was recommended by the High Level Committee on Influx constituted by the Government last year," Khyriem said.

The blockade, which was also enforced for several days during the two-month long agitation had affected the movement of vehicles through National Highways 40 and 44 considered the lifelines for landlocked Mizoram, Tripura and parts of Manipur and Barak valley in Assam.
Meanwhile, the Opposition Meghalaya People's Forum and several other organisations and church bodies have also criticized the way the state government dealt with the situation, which they said, have hit the poor badly.
"The Chief Minister should shed his ego and come clean to the negotiating table," United Democratic Party working president Paul Lyngdoh said.

Archbishop Dominic Jala, who is the head of the Catholic Church, biggest Church organisation in the state, has also condemned the situation arising out of a misunderstanding between the government and pressure groups.

He said, "In the fight of two giants, it's the grass that suffers and hence a solution is needed to end the stalemate."
In the past seven weeks of the ILP violence in the state, two lives were lost, properties worth crores of rupees were damaged and over 70 pro-ILP activists were arrested.
A special court has also been constituted to try all cases related to ILP fracas and the state government has filed a Rs 31 crore damage suit against pro-ILP activists and their groups involved in the violence.