Jowai, July 30: The Jaintia Youth Federation Central Body is surprise to note that the honourable Minister of Forest Govt of Meghalaya Shri. Prestone Tynsong had tactically charged the Cement companies of Jaintia Hills that they had misused an area of 16 sq Km (1600 hectares) of land. Indeed the JYF would like to praise our honourable Minister for being an eye opener to the people of the state. However to charge the cos in this matter of misuse of land is not enough, for many issues needed to bring to light in order for everyone to understand.
The question is who is really responsible for granting NOC to the said companies. Is it the autonomous council? Is it the State Forest Department? Or the so called Single window channel of the State Government. The truth of the matter had reached final stage of this dreaded disease which seems un-curable unless drastic action is taken by the State authorities.
The Jaintia Youth Federation (JYF) had time and again in its humble capacity had complained against these erring of such companies to the extent of filing the PIL in the honorable supreme court however we have not received any support from the government which implies that even our state government is indirectly encouraged the companies despite knowing the fact that much and much encroachment on forest land has been practiced by such companies. The public has the right to know why the government for so long had kept silent and mere remain mere spectator of these facts without taken any penalties actions, which strongly pointed to the fact that seemingly certain public representatives did fishy lucrative bonus from these giants monster that affected the economy of the state as remarked by Mr P Majaw president JYF
Furthermore, it is learnt that as per government norms that an area of land within 5 hectares doesn’t need any NOC from Forest ministry nor Dept of Forest Govt of Meghalaya. However these shrewd business men of all the cement plants in paper works everything are normal but practically in order to uplift their sizable economic return had totally violated the Forest Act of 1980. This has been done without respecting the law of the land and consequently affected the environment and to a large extent deprived the right to live for the people of the near and surrounding areas.
How many times that the Lukha River being the life line of the people of the areas also being one of the attracted tourist spot of Jaintia Hills has been affected by the discharge from these companies? The same had been destroyed and polluted to the extent that all life forms had been much devastated due to dumping of waste emitted from these factories yet these facts has been ignored and avoid responsibilities by those factories.
Now as mentioned earlier that this seemingly incurable diseases needed to be cured only by drastic actions that needed to be taken by the government. However it is to be seen that either the government will seriously take this as matter of concern or is it just an effort to fool the public by the honourable minister of forest Mr P Tynsong.
If the government is serious in its intention to take this issue to its logical conclusion and it should therefore take steps and demand actions against such cement factories. We hope that the government will take action against those cement companies at the earliest if it is really serious in tackling this menace. We also hope that the minister will practice and what he preached and make sure that his work speaks louder than his words.(SP News)
