By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, JAN 27: Traditional heads and villagers of Umsawkhwan in Ri Bhoi district on Friday staged a protest in front of the DGP’s office demanding immediate release of former MLA Stanlywiss Rymbai, who was arrested recently.
Rymbai was remanded to 14 days judicial custody by a local court after he was arrested by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in connection with the multi-crore land scam in Ri Bhoi district.
The villagers armed with placards claimed that Rymbai, who was given the power of attorney by the dorbar shnong, was “innocent” and the village is the rightful owner of the land under dispute.
The forest department had released Rs 8 crore in favour of former Congress Umroi MLA Stanlywiss Rymbai for acquiring the land at Mawpalai afforestation area measuring 1.78 sq km.
The Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) had directed the forest department to pursue the matter rigorously in the High Court to facilitate reclaiming of the land and recovery of the Rs 8 crore that was paid.
“We demand that he (Rymbai) should be released immediately,” Umsawkhwan village headman H Nongkseh told reporters at the sideline of the surprised protest held today.
He said the Mawpalai forest belongs to Umsawkhwan village and in 1953 had agreed to handover the land on the request of the Soil & Conservation department for taking up afforestation project to plant trees.
“The agreement at that time had a clause saying after 30 years, the department should return the forest to the dorbar shnong,” Nongkseh said adding “This was also agreed in a meeting convened by the then Minister of Soil & Conservation Dr Henry Lamin that the forest be transferred back.”
Claiming that several letters requesting the state government to return the forest was submitted from time to time, he informed, “It was in 2008-09 that the state government decided to keep the forest by paying a compensation of Rs 10 crore, which the dorbar shnong agreed.”
The headman said the dorbar shnong then given Rymbai the power of attorney and the state government also issued a notification as per the Land Acquisition Act for acquiring the Mawpalai forest.
He informed there was no objection raised on the issue and accordingly compensation of Rs 8 crore was paid to dorbar shnong.
“Surprisingly after all this, the state government all of a sudden claimed that it is the owner of the forest and that the dorbar shnong should refund the Rs 8 crore,” he said.
Informing that an appeal was filed before the Meghalaya High Court in 2012, Nongkseh claimed, “The matter was disposed of by the High Court with a direction that the state government should pay the pending amount of Rs 2 crore.”
He said subsequent to this, the state government filed a money recovery suit and an FIR was also filed by CID. The dorbar shnong filed an appeal with the District Session Judge Court at Nongpoh, whose ruling was also in its favour.
“Later the dorbar shnong again filed a money recovery suit in 2014 to which the state government did not contest leading to the local court to pass an ex parte order on the matter. Now the court will summon witnesses for their statements before giving a final verdict on this matter,” Nongkseh said.
When asked, the headman said that the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council (KHADC) is also aware that the forest at Mawpalai belongs to the dorbar shnong.
He also alleged that the members of the dorbar shnong did acknowledged the summon issued by the PAC but when they when for attending the summon they were made to wait outside the room, where the meeting was held.
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