Paul Lyngdoh slammed for ‘threatening the public’
Shillong, Nov 6: The Joint Action Committee (JAC) Shillong Ropeway Project has slammed Tourism Minister Paul Lyngoh for the justifications given for the project and launched a sit-in demonstration in front of the Kiang Nangbah statue at Barik here on Friday.
Even as Lyngdoh maintained that the government cannot scrap or shift the project at this juncture, the protesters stood firm on their stand of not letting it happen.
He stated that the lease agreement signed four years ago binds the project to its present site, and that it won’t affect any water sources as alleged and it would stay far from the sacred Lum Shyllong peak.
JAC member Venitia Mawlong accused the minister of threatening the public, saying, “I want to make it clear especially to the Tourism Minister Bah Paul Lyngdoh… how can he say that there is no need to cry, to weep… does he understand what we mothers individually are going through, he should not personally attack us.”
“We as the JAC have come out to the streets and this is not the beginning but it is to show the public that the JAC has not rested since the first day,” she said.
However, she said the JAC would not move the high court seeking a stay on the project. A court case, she argued, would transfer the fight from the people to lawyers on both sides and bring the street agitation to an end.
“We will fight ourselves as much as we can,” she said.
On water sources, Mawlong said it pained her to see a man who once loved his community now, in her words, using the chair to threaten.
Challenging the minister’s claim that water sources would not be affected by the project, she said, “Do you think a person from outside knows the water sources for drinking. I do not think so and Bah Paul also should study. Please do your homework, no more about Lum Shyllong,” she said.
“We stand firm… do not touch Lum Shyllong at all and we will not allow you to touch Lum Shyllong,” she said.
In his address, Greentech Foundation chairman H Bansiewdor Nonglang said, “We want to inform the public to also know the truths. Until now, the Government has not told you the truths.”
He said the public debate had focused on 544 felled trees, and the pain over those trees was real. But the documents, he claimed, showed what was coming at the terminals.
“Do you know, at the lower terminal what those buildings mean, at the upper terminal what those buildings mean? Do you know there will come restaurants, food courts? I am not just speaking words, here in writing, it is all there,” he said.
For Nonglang, that pointed to a larger danger: privatisation, commercialisation and exploitation of Lum Shyllong.
“If we lose it once, do not talk about Lum Shyllong anymore from now onwards,” he said.
Nonglang said the foundation had acted as elders, with caution and after thinking twice, even while being countered by the government.
Its involvement, he said, began when mothers from Laban and Lawsohtun came to the GTF office in May, June and July 2026, worried that trees were being felled.
