Staff Reporter

Shillong, Nov 1: Former NPP state president and lone Rajya Sabha MP Dr WR Kharlukhi on Tuesday predicted that the National People’s Party (NPP) will get an absolute majority in 2028.

“I don’t doubt that you write it today that if everything goes well, we will get absolute majority in 2028,” Dr Kharlukhi told reporters soon after handing over charge to the newly appointed state president Prestone Tynsong here.

Currently, NPP is the single largest political party with 26 MLAs in the 60-member House.

On his decision to request the party to relieve him from the post, the Rajya Sabha MP said that 16 years is long enough for him to continue as the state president.

“What I used to believe is that at a certain point of time, we have to share the responsibility. I think 16 years is long enough. I am very happy that at least from the beginning in this party, when we first started it and I do remember we loss miserably in 2013, we got God’s Blessing and we have reached this level. I am a very happy man,” he said.

Thanking the NPP national president for accepting his request, Dr Kharlukhi said that Prestone Tynsong is the right person for the post of state president.

“Prestone is the right person. He is a veteran of many battles and I don’t see that there is any problem and I am very sure under his leadership the party will go from strength to strength,” he said. He also termed the party’s achievement as God’s blessing.

“We always believe that what we are doing is God’s Blessing. As humans, we did our level best but I always remember that whatever I did is because of God’s Blessing.”

Further, Dr Kharlukhi said that he is not keen to contest the Lok Sabha elections. “I never had a thought also for Lok Sabha plus I do believe we need young leaders. Also three years from now I will be 70 so I think I am too old a dog for that,” he said.

He also recalled how he turned down the offer to be Rajya Sabha MP in 2008 and said, “I was just talking to chief minister that somehow he could convince me (this time to be Rajya Sabha MP) and I took it as a blessing from God because when I got my daughter also got for her PG there so it is both ways. I thank the party for that and just now I said I had decided on my career in 1988 so that time I could not get what I wanted so I thought politics is no but again I am back in politics.”

On his role in the NPP now, Dr Kharlukhi said, “My role as MP is quite a big role. I have to travel throughout the state so I think the party is doing me good because as I said travelling as MP is one way but travelling as MP and state president is two ways. I told that Tynsong is much younger than me so he will be quite active. I know at his age I know what we can do.”