TURA:
wo aspirants for the national party’s ticket — one a former legislator and the other a sitting district council representative, but both highly vocal — is putting the BJP in a quandary for the coveted South Tura seat ahead of next year’s assembly polls.
The entry of former South Tura legislator, John Lesley K Sangma, into the saffron party ahead of polls has suddenly put a question mark on the candidature of Bernard Rimpu N Marak who, till three weeks ago, was the “much anticipated” BJP candidate to take on Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma.
South Tura is currently represented by the chief minister after his younger sister Agatha K Sangma, who won the seat in 2018, resigned soon after to pave way for his by-election following the decision of the Meghalaya Democratic Alliance (MDA) to name Conrad K Sangma to head the new state government. The then Mukul Sangma-led Congress had failed to cross the magic figure of 30 seats and was rejected by the UDP’s supremo Donkupar Roy to form a new coalition government with regional parties leaving out the NPP and the BJP.
A former ANVC-B chairman that signed a peace pact with the government leading to their disbandment, Bernard N Marak, also known as Rimpu, shot into prominence after he too handed a shock defeat to the NPP in its bastion Tura, during the Garo Hills Autonomous District Council elections in 2021.
The victory of Bernard and the defeat of the NPP candidate Semford B Sangma, who happened to be the working president of the party for the entire Garo Hills, sent ripples across the political spectrum of the state given that this was a district council constituency that was part of the chief minister’s legislative assembly seat and also happened to be Tura town- the epicentre of the entire Garo Hills region.
The BJP MDC has been going hammer and tongs at the ruling MDA government and the chief minister as he cements his political grip in Tura, until a former legislator who had been lying low for close to four years suddenly emerged in the BJP camp.
The entry of John Lesley K Sangma, according to political watchers, doesn’t bode well for the MDC who has been meticulously preparing his upcoming political battle in the most prestigious contest of the state.
“Till the other day, it was a well known fact that the contest would be a direct fight between the chief minister and the BJP MDC. The arrival of John Lesley K Sangma has now changed the entire equation,” says a voter from Tura Bazaar, a part of the chief minister’s constituency.
John Lesley is not just an MLA from Tura but a former MDC of the GHADC. His first political victory came from Tura MDC seat as an Independent despite the then ruling Congress refusing to give him a ticket owing to his opposition to the then chief minister Mukul Sangma.
In 2013, while still elected as an MDC, he gave a shock defeat to the ruling Congress from the prestigious Tura assembly seat winning by a narrow margin of less than 30 votes that came from the count of the postal ballots after both, himself and Congress candidate Billykid A Sangma, were tied.
“The problem for the BJP now lies in whom to give the party ticket. A sitting elected member or a former member? Antagonising one by giving the other could also backfire by way of dissent and contest as a rebel candidate,” says a Congress worker from Tura.
For the NPP it is pleasing news, as one senior party member says, “In our camp there is no dissent but one voice in support of our only candidate who is the state’s chief minister.”
A BJP member says that the party has a “robust” system of deciding on the candidature taking into account the public support he or she retains. While the tag of former legislator gives weightage to a candidate, equally in contention is for the person who currently represents the party in the peoples’ house.