Hridayapath, Dispatch 7: Meghalaya And Nagaland Voters Give A Big Thumbs Up To Central Government Schemes

Meghalaya and Nagaland go to polls in the first phase (19 April). They collectively contribute just three seats and hence do not garner much national news space.

Let us find out what people from this part of our country are thinking.

Resubalpara, North Garo Hills District, Meghalaya

After taking a peek into rolling hills of the west and east Garo Hills, I stop at Resubalpara, the district headquarters of north Garo Hills. I meet Tenang Shira, Etchaswar Mara and company. They are construction workers and plumbers.

I immediately get talking about the PM Awas Yojana and Jal Jeevan Mission. They were doubly happy — the infrastructure was getting built and they getting employment. The Awas Yojna is just taking off, they said.

They said that the rural roads are in a pretty bad shape though. The hospital nearby does not have proper doctors and they have to rush to Guwahati for emergencies. The youngsters mostly do not have jobs and go to Guwahati for work. They get free ration but the grains are not of great quality.

The farmers here mostly grow rice and cabbage. They have not heard about the Krishi Samman Nidhi, which was kind of strange. Maybe it is because they were in the construction business. They pointed to the school where these men had built the toilets under Swachh Bharat Mission. They seemed to very happy about their contribution to the society.

Meghalaya has two parliamentary constituencies. Tura and Shillong. The Garo Hills fall under Tura and has been represented by the Sangma family for a while. They are from National People's Party (NPP), a NDA (National Democratic Alliance) ally.

Agatha Sangma is the Member of Parliament (MP) and her brother, the bass guitar playing Conrad Sangma (check out him strumming "the Summer of 69") is the Chief Minister.

When I ask political questions, they smile and speak among each other in their language. These are polite people that do not say anything negative about others. The group likes Prime Minister Narendra Modi. They say he is good for the country.

Tenang says that Agatha is available to meet with general public and she has done a decent job. But, people are also looking at the Congress candidate, Saleng Sangma, with interest.

I ask the tricky question of how much of a role Church plays in political choices that people make here. They said that they definitely hear what the church says but they make up their mind on their own.

I re-enter Meghalaya through the west Khasi Hills through Assam. It falls under the Shillong constituency represented by Congress's redoubtable Vincent Pala, a former PWD engineer, who is gunning to be a fourth time MP.

He is one of those nine candidates in all of India that has an opportunity to make a hattrick under the Modi wave. He won in 2014 and 2019 with sizeable margin. He is up against Dr Ampareen Lyngdoh, former state cabinet minister, making both the NDA candidates in Meghalaya to be women.

I meet with Chanchani, a school teacher. She is on her way back home, about to drive her scooter in one of the many beautiful (and dangerous) hanging bridges.

She is happy that the school system here is good. She teaches in a private school. But, she says that Poshan Scheme is very helpful to kids. She is unaware of the women's scholarships programme. She says that malaria is quite prevalent in Meghalaya and something has to be done about it.

Studies have shown that changing crop patterns and deforestation for cultivating paddy has changed the strain of the Anopheles mosquito causing the disease.

The people of Meghalaya are very hesitant to talk about their voting preferences unlike people in say Bihar or Uttar Pradesh. I ask Chanchani about which way is the wind blowing.

She is diplomatic in saying that both Pala and Lyngdoh are good candidates. She hasn't applied her mind about who to vote for.

I press her on one government scheme that has impacted her the most and she unhesitatingly says that it is the water supply programme.

Longtho, Mokokchung District, Nagaland

It seems almost impossible to get an Inner Line Permit online to enter Nagaland. The website keeps crashing, I guess by design. While in Jorhat, I dial my connections to see whether they can help me with the ILP issue. (They are still getting it!)

In the hotel where I was staying, I meet with Joel. He is well-dressed and speaks smartly and casually. I learn that he runs the Edith Douglas School in Mokokchung, one of the largest private schools there. It was started by his father, who is a Malayali. His mother is an Ao. He said that he spent his high school at Ebenezer School in Chennai. And we bond.

He is very hesitant to talk about politics. To my utter disappointment, he doesn't seem to know much about the political intricacies. He seems more like the south Delhi types that are little apathetic about things around them.

The positive spin to it might be that the government is getting out of the way of the upper and middle class people. Prime Minister Modi in his chat with Bill Gates mentions that one of the objectives of his government is to get out the lives of the middle-class.

Since he is the education sector I ask about schools in Nagaland. He says that the government schools are as good or as bad as it is in the rest of the country.

I ask him whether people in Nagaland speak good English because of the church. He flinched. Even I felt bad about asking this question which had a parochial ring to it. Perhaps this dilemma is that even wannabe journalists face.

As with most things in life, I take the jugaad option and take the bumpy road into Nagaland without the permit. We pass by a large Macleod Russell tea factory on the way.

I meet the guards at the check-point and tell them that we will be back in a few hours and have no intention of spending more than a day in Nagaland. They all looked "sleep deprived", to put it politely. They let me go without a permit. I am not sure that they even noted the vehicle's number.

I move towards Longtho village in Mokokchung district. I stop by Gillead pharmacy, which is run by a young girl named Sangty. She manages the medical store as well as a grocery store next to each other, bossing around men much senior to her. She is hesitant to speak and shoos me away saying that she is busy.

I buy mosquito repellent and biscuits and ask casually if she is the richest person in the village as she runs two stores. She blushes and starts chatting. Humour helps I guess.

She speaks flawless English. She says that the education is not bad and because of the church influence they speak better English. She said she is both confused and excited about going to vote for the first time. She says that she does care about politics. She candidly admits that she has to learn a bit more before voting. I quip that she has to hurry up as Nagaland votes in the first phase.

I ask her about the development work in the area. She points to the bad roads (they are quite bad). But she is happy with the water supply and electricity. She says her mother gets a subsidised LPG cylinder.

I ask about the health facilities for adolescent women. She feels that the clinic nearby has good counsellors. She says she wants to pursue either nursing or hospitality. She plans to go out of Nagaland to "India".

She says that most of the women in the village are the from the Ao tribe. The pharmacy assistant chips into say that people here vote based on all things — the personality of the candidate, the work done, and to which community he belongs to.

The church also gives its opinion. I ask about what people think about Prime Minister Narendra Modi. She says matter-of-factly that many people like him, while some people don't. 

Congress's state president S Jamir is Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDI Alliance) candidate. He is an Ao from Mokokchung. He has been accused of making appeals based on religious lines. People say that Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Yatra that passed through Kohima had struck a vibe with people.

Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP) leads the NDA government in the state. It also hold the current MP seat. It has fielded Dr Chumben Murry, a former state cabinet minister. He is a medical doctor — yet another highly qualified candidate fielded by NDA. Looks like an exciting contest.

My driver was the most excited person when we turn back from Nagaland. He says that it his first time he has taken a guest who went only to the "most boring" places. But he also added that he learned quite a lot from me in this trip and thanked me.

This report is part of Swarajya's 50 Ground Stories Project - an attempt to throw light on themes and topics that are often overlooked or looked down. You can support this initiative by sponsoring as little as ₹2999. Click here for more details.

Read the previous articles in this series:

Hridayapath, Dispatch 1: What Moradabad, Pilibhit, And Rampur Think About Modi Sarkar And 2024 Election

Hridayapath, Dispatch 2: Discussing National And Local Issues In This Slice Of Northern Uttar Pradesh

Hridayapath, Dispatch 3: The Uttar Pradesh Capstone — Election Trail Chronicles From Ghaziabad To Kushinagar

Hridayapath, Dispatch 4 — 'Phirse Modi Ho, Bihar Me Bahar Ho'

Hridayapath, Dispatch 5: Too Much Negativity Peddled About Bihar — Notes From Mithila And Seemanchal

Hridayapath, Dispatch 6: North Bengal — A BJP Fortress In The Making