Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma cast his vote at Walbakgre -29 polling station in Tura, Garo Hills in the ongoing Assembly polls in the state on Monday and exuded confidence in the result being in his favour.
In an exclusive interview with NewsX, Meghalaya CM Conrad Sangma said, “We always go and vote and make it a point to stand in line because when voting, we make it clear that we are a citizen of this country and henceforth stand in a queue like every other person. It is good to know that we had a better turnout than before so let’s hope for the best.
He added, “We are a small constituency and hence the connection and engagement with the public is very close and hence the campaigns are very aggressive. People are involved in the election campaign very passionately and hence when the voting days come up, they participate very actively.”
Speaking to NewsX on Monday, Meghalaya CM Conrad Sangma said that forming pre-poll alliance dilutes the message one wants to send out to the people.
“I have been very clear that we always fight elections on our own because I feel that we go to people with what vision we have. If we go with pre-poll alliance, we are already diluting that particular aspect. If people do not give the mandate to us, it leads the political parties to sit down and figure out how to form a government that will be workable and give a stable government for the sake of the state.”
When asked about the opposition in competition, SM Sangma said, “I do not take my opponents lightly. But, leaders from Congress have joined TMC and have seen the work before. Also, TMC is suddenly coming into the picture but is not able to penetrate into our social fabric and thus it is not so easy for them to come in immediately. This is basically the break-away of the Congress. As the opposition gets more and more fractured and there are multi-cornered fights amid the opposition, there is slightly more advantage.”
Speaking on the pitches brought forth by the NPP during elections, Conrad Sangma said, “Firstly, the fact that there is stability in the government that wasn’t there in Meghalaya for a long time. Secondly, peace in the state in a larger state as we have seen a lot of insurgency and disturbance. Last five years have been relatively lot better than the previous years. Thirdly, the kind of work that has gone in are much better than the previous fifteen years. We’ve given much better roads, more water connections, more children immunized, and more self-help groups for women. This is enough to show that the development is more than the previous years. Lastly, the fact that the opposition is divided along with these factors is giving hope to the people that NPP will be the party that will take the peace and development forward and provide much more stable government than the opposition.”
“There is a state government and a central government. And in the federal structure where we work together and there has to be some synchronization in this. Obviously both have to work efficiently. So no matter what anybody would say in the political area, the point is that both have to work together ultimately. The efficiency level and level of implementation is what determines the success of how well the development moves forward,” he said, adding that Delivering mechanism, governance, ensuring capacity building, monitoring accountability are the keys to ensure good governance and that state government has to do majority of the job and that is the key to ensuring the schemes end up reaching people.
Speaking about the poll results, CM Sangma said, “A general trend is there where people are looking at NPP as the right option because of the factors I mentioned: Peace, stability, development and the fractured opposition. These four factors put together with the campaign gives a sense that we are moving to a larger number than we had last time and hoping that we touch closer to the halfway mark. We have worked hard in the last 1-1.5 years and positive that the people will give us a second chance.”
