GB leader served with show-cause for lauding Modi’s crusade
DIMAPUR, SEPTEMBER 1: Power politics often lead to unusual things in the political game itself. Some say ~ guilty mind in authority bound to commit mistakes. A Naga folk tale goes: when in a village meet, the thieves were told that people with ‘red marks’ on their heads akin to cocks run away with the hens; the guilty ones on their own would move their hands over their hair.
Nothing much had actually happened. Only the GB Federation general secretary Shikuto Zalipu said if corruption is an ‘issue’, Prime Minister Narendra Modi should start cleansing the system in Nagaland first. The NDPP-led Opposition-less Government reacted nervously and served a notice to Zalipu.
The show-cause notice served by Commissioner, Nagaland, wanted to know from Zalipu why “disciplinary action” should not be taken against him.
Commissioner Rovilatuo Mor alleged that Zalipu’s media statement, as reported by Nagaland Page on August 17, failed to maintain “neutrality” vis-à-vis Guidelines issued to GBs on September 14, 2020.
According to sources, many in political circles were shell-shocked. Moreover, Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio’s regime and the saffron party have signed a pact to announce 20:40 seat share.
So, does the alleged ‘intolerance’ of the national level being extended to Northeast also?
But some administrative and policy decisions are often just funny and even unbecoming.
Former Chief Minister and Congress leader KL Chishi told this newspaper that if such a show-cause notice has been served, the notice can be “easily challenged in a court of law”.
“Senior civil servants should know what they are worth, what they should sign. Such a show-cause notice to a village Chief, who is also Kukami (in Sumi region akin to Anghs among Konyaks) is directly an infringement of the rights of citizen and of his right to free speech and that too to a village chieftain. He is not GB by appointment for a salary, so such a notice is uncalled for”, Chishi said.
On the August 17 issue of Nagaland Page, it was reported that to the question, what in the Prime Minister’s speech on August 15 was the best part that ‘touched’ his heart, Zalipu had said, “It is the Prime Minister’s visible determination to fight corruption and nepotism. I liked the manner he delivered the speech and clenched his fist. Only a sincere man can be angry against corruption. We Nagas are also angry. Corruption and nepotism has harmed Nagas like nothing else.”
A few other GB leaders have also maintained that Prime Minister Modi’s crusade against Corruption ought to be supported.
(Page News Service)
