KHUDA upset with state govt

SHILLONG, JAN 27: Opposition KHUDA in the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council (KHADC) came down heavily on the Congress led state government for adopting what it called an ‘insensitive’ and ‘lackadaisical’ attitude to the many important bills passed by the district council.

“Many of the important bills passed by the KHADC in the past few years are lying pending with the state government till now,” Khasi Hills United Democratic Alliance (KHUDA) leader Pynshngain N Syiem told reporters after a meeting on Tuesday.

KHUDA is also a Congress led opposition alliance in the KHADC.

Terming the unnecessary delay as ‘lacking of seriousness’, Syiem said, “This clearly shows that the District Council Affairs (DCA) department and the Law department have failed to study the bills submitted by the district council.” He argued that the process of clearing the pending bills takes hardly a month time if the state government was serious enough to examine them.

According to Syiem, there is no justification on the part of the state government to continue to hold on to the bills for such a long period.  “If there are flaws in any of the bills, it is the duty of the DCA department to ensure that they (bills) are immediately referred back to the council for further rectification,” he asserted.

Syiem, however, said, “But what the irony is that till today, the council is yet to be aware about the status of the various pending bills with the government,” adding “By now, am sure the bills must have gathering dust in the secretariat.”

Syiem expressed fear that if the bills do not see the light of becoming an Act he is afraid all the efforts put by the council in formulating them will go down to the drain.

KHUDA has also decided to write to the ARPA led Executive Committee (EC) on the matter.

“We would write to the EC led by Adelbert Nongrum requesting him on the urgent need to convene a meeting of all the MDCs from both the opposition as well as ruling to deliberate and discuss on the matter, ”Syiem said.

Syiem suggested the EC also write to the DCA department seeking a status report on the various pending bills of the council.  “Besides, we also urged the EC to consider the need to constitute a joint committee comprising of the Council, Law department and DCA department to speed up the process of passing of the various pending bills passed by the Council,” he said.- By Our Reporter