Centre to set up probe into Mukroh firing incident: Meghalaya CM

SHILLONG, NOV 24: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Thursday assured that the Centre will constitute an enquiry by a central agency into the killing of six persons in a firing by Assam police at Mukroh village in West Jaintia Hills District.

The assurance was given to a cabinet delegation led by Meghalaya chief minister Conrad K Sangma during a meeting held in New Delhi.

“The union home minister has given us the assurance that he will constitute an enquiry under a central agency and the order for that should be coming out anytime and we thank the union home minister for his positive response,” Sangma told reporters.

He said during the meeting, the delegation had briefed the union home minister into the different circumstances that led to the incident.

“Apart from that we have also seen statements have come from Assam CM that the entire incident and the shooting that took place were unprovoked and there was use of excessive power from Assam police. Keeping that in mind we have requested the government of India to constitute a central agency enquiry into this entire incident that took place either CBI or NIA or any appropriate agency so that the truth can come out and more importantly action is taken against those who are responsible for this inhumane act,” he said.

Sangma further informed that the delegation also shared with the union home minister that the root cause of the entire tension that has been building up in that area and other areas has to do with the long pending border issue between the two states.

“And different incidents have led to the situation becoming more tense which ultimately led to the situation where a couple of days this unfortunate incident happened and therefore, it is very important that all effort should be made to ensure that the border dispute is settled,” he said.

Stating that due to the unfortunate incident, the ongoing border talks has hit a certain hurdle, the chief minister said, “…there is a lot of area that trust has to be built and hence the intervention of the government of India will be necessary in that front.”

“We also discussed about the security and safety of the people in the border area specially in the sensitive zones and the disputed zones and we urged the government of India to initiate a process to ensure both the state governments come together to ensure such incident do not take place in the future which will require both the state governments, district administrations and different machineries to work closely to avoid any kind of such incidents in the future and hence intervention of government of India will be necessary to move in that direction,” he added.

Meanwhile, the cabinet delegation also took up long pending issues related to the inclusion of the Khasi and Garo languages in the Eighth Schedule and implementation of Inner Line Permit (ILP) with the union home minister for his necessary intervention.

“The demand for inclusion of the Khasi and Garo languages in the Eighth Schedule was reiterated once again to the union home minister. We also once again mentioned about the need to implement the ILP in Meghalaya for which a resolution was passed in the Assembly,” he said.

He said the delegation also urged the Centre to allow the state government to go ahead with the implementation of the Meghalaya Residents Safety and Security Act (MRSSA), which was passed in the Assembly but is waiting for the consent of the Centre.

“Apart from that, we also stressed that the basic supply of essential commodities into Meghalaya should not be disrupted and full support should be there from neighbouring states and from the government of India to ensure supply of essential commodities should not be impacted in the state of Meghalaya,” the chief minister said.

By Our Reporter