Meghalaya UDP Chief Metbah Lyngdoh to head State planning board as chairman.

Staff Reporter

Shillong, March 9: United Democratic Party (UDP) Chief and former Assembly Speaker Metbah Lyngdoh is all set to head the state’s planning board as its new chairman.

Informing this today, Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma said, “A notification (in this regard) will be coming up today.”

Sangma also acknowledged receiving the official communication on the decision taken by the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Hills State People’s Democratic Party about sharing of the cabinet berths among their respective MLAs.

“Yes, the BJP has written to me and the HSPDP also when they first met me that was the condition and the discussion that took place,” he said.

As far as the UDP is concerned, Sangma however said, “That of course is an internal matter (of the UDP). They have not mentioned to me anything about that (sharing of cabinet berths) but when it came to the HSPDP and the BJP, these discussions took place in front of me.”

The UDP has got two ministerial berths while one each for BJP and HSPDP.

The Chief Minister said, “When the time comes, we will discuss this matter. Yes, the representation of the NPP in the cabinet may be not as much as one would want it to be as you said because the numbers are large but as I said we have certain circumstances under which we have to work and will have to sometimes make adjustments and that is what we have done but we will definitely explore the options that also in the future”.