Sweepers’ Lane residents may approach Court

A Correspondent

Shillong, July 1: The residents of Sweeper’s Colony at Them Ïew Mawlong are now contemplating to go to the court in an anticipatory move to prevent the state government from evicting them from that place. According to sources, the residents of the area are in consultation with legal experts as to how to file a petition in the court so that they can thwart any attempt to evict them from the place.

It may be mentioned that earlier too around four to five cases were filed before the court on the matter of evicting the residents from Them Ïew Mawlong.

However the court had established that the Shillong Municipal Board (SMB) is the owner of the land and if any dispute should arise it should be between the SMB and Hima Mylliem but there should not be a third party.

It may be mentioned that recently, the women of Them Ïew Mawlong protested by carrying placards when the High Level Committee directed the Directorate of Land Records and Survey and the SMB to conduct survey in the area.

When the SMB recently conducted the inventory survey, the residents did not cooperate with the officials and instead locked up their homes.

According to data the Sweepers Colony has about 252 houses and more than double the number of families residing there on both sides of the market road in the heart of the city (Ïew Mawlong).

Although there are different estimates of population but according to a ‘Note on Sweeper’s Colony, Mawlonghat’ submitted by the Director of Urban Affairs Department, Shillong in July 2010 there were 200 families residing in 1990 that increased to 249 as per a joint survey by the Shillong Municipal Board and the Harijan Panchayat Committee in March-April 2007. It rose to 342 in 2010.