Sweepers’ Colony issue: Meghalaya Govt to invite HPC for talks

Staff Reporter

Shillong, Oct 26: Deputy Chief Minister in-charge of Home (Police) Prestone Tynsong today informed that the State government will invite the Harijan Panchayat Committee (HPC) next month for discussion on resolving the issue pertaining to the relocation of 342 families of Sweepers’ Colony from Them Iew Mawlong.

“We will have one more meeting with them (HPC). Unfortunately, Puja just came in so hopefully by next month we will be able to call them and sit once and for all and we will submit an affidavit to the court,” Tynsong told reporters.

On September 29, the Meghalaya government had informed the High Court that it has agreed to increase the individual plot sizes as requested by the residents of the Sweepers’ Colony.

With regards to the dilapidated condition of the roads, Tynsong, who is also in charge of PWD (Roads) said, “I have already instructed right from the commissioner & secretary, secretary and the chief engineers of the PWD to now since the dry and working season start be it any to make sure that the repairing and maintenance of road start at the earliest possible.”

On Byrnihat being categorized as the most polluted area in Meghalaya, the deputy chief minister said that he has asked the chief secretary to take up this matter with the Assam counterpart.

“In as far as Byrnihat is concerned, the left side while going to Guwahati is Meghalaya and the right side is Assam. I think you must have seen quite a number of factories all along the right side whereas from our left side we have only a designated industrial estate and we do also have factories but it is well monitored by the MSPCB. As far as Assam is concerned, I have asked the CS to take up this matter with the counterpart Assam to find out ways and means on how to monitor because we can’t go and monitor those factories in Assam which were functioning till now,” he said.

Govt to address shortage of manpower in police dept

The state government has decided to complete the recruitment process to address the shortage of manpower in the police department within this year.

Informing this after chairing a meeting at the police headquarters, Deputy Chief Minister in-charge Home (Police) Prestone Tynsong said there is not less than 3500 to 4000 shortage of manpower in the police department.

“Today, we have taken a decision right now I think we are all aware we do have the drive for appointment of different categories of police in the state of Meghalaya about 1000 plus and the personal interview is still on and it will be over in another 2-3 weeks then they will be appointed and again the next session of recruitment drive will immediately take place and we also wanted to complete the whole process of recruitment drive within this year itself,” Tynsong said.

“Once the filling up of vacancies is done I am very sure we will be able at least to overcome one of the biggest challenges that we have not only at the SP level but upto the outpost level, we have so much shortage of manpower,” he added.

According to him, the government will try its best to ensure better policing and boost the morale of the police besides maintaining the law and order in the state of Meghalaya.

Asserting the need to increase the manpower of the police department, Tynsong sad, “The police department is the biggest organization as far as government department is concerned, we have not less than 16,000 forces and now we need to increase that also and we discuss about how to create new sanctions.”

“In other states, I am telling you they have 35,000 – 40,000 manpower. Like in Manipur, they have a manpower of 26,000 whereas here we have only 16,000. Therefore, we wanted to increase the total strength of police personnel in Meghalaya,” he added.

On the infrastructure aspect, the deputy chief minister said that the Director General of Police (DGP) has been asked to send all the requirements pertaining to the issue where quite a number of police stations and SP offices do not have their own buildings.

“Of course we cannot do it in one go but in phase wise and I will try my best to get maximum sanction (for construction of) SP offices, quarters of the SP and police officers and then come down to the police stations, where some are still functioning from rented houses. We wanted to make sure we have our own buildings and offices,” he said.

Tynsong also said that the government would also construct good barracks at the police outposts including the 7 newly created outposts along the Meghalaya-Assam border.

“As far as those newly created outposts immediately we are going to construct the barrack for the functioning of these outposts in all the 7 outposts and we will also increase the manpower there,” he added.

He further informed, “I had requested DGP to prioritize it one by one as we can’t give sanction in one go but in priority basis. We will do it according to the recommendation to be made by the DGP.”

Meanwhile, Tynsong said that the meeting also discussed the functioning of the forensic laboratory in the state.

“Of course few more instruments that we need to requisition immediately and of course we do have little shortage of manpower that has also been discussed. We wanted to attend to this. See like DNA test we need to promptly get the report as you know it well when you talk about the conviction rate it is very low in absence of this test. I have requested the DG to again bring all the details to the department and we will accordingly positively respond to the requirement which is to be submitted by the office of the DGP,” he added.