WOMAN HOME MINISTER IN MATRILINEAL MEGHALAYA

It is only apt that Meghalaya following a matrilineal system in India’s northeast corner now has a women looking after the safety and security of its people in Roshan Warjri as the first women Home minister of the state.

Warjri becomes one of the few women ministers to hold the important Home portfolio traditionally reserved for men. Apart from the Home department Warjri has the additional charge of home (jails) and the public works department (buildings), equally important portfolios.

Warjri, 63, was elected from North Shillong assembly constituency in the state capital and is the first woman in Northeast and eastern India to hold the Home department. In fact, she is the second women to hold the portfolio in India after P. Sabita Indra Reddy in Andhra Pradesh.

She first joined politics in 1993 and won on a Hill People’s Union ticket. She returned to the Assembly in 1998 contesting on a United Democratic Party and held the urban affairs portfolio, but thereafter she did not contest, until this assembly polls.

Warjri has her task cut out ahead of her. Meghalaya though having a matrilineal society, wherein women retain their surname after marriage (Warjri’s late husband was Korbar Sing Phanbuh ) and children take their mother’s surname, crime against women is high, especially rape.

In 2012 Meghalaya, having a population of about 30 lakh or 3 million, there were 236 cases registered relating to crime against women. Out these cases, 158 were rape of women. The figure is an increase from the previous year which registered 130 rape cases of women, out of 269 reported cases of crimes against women.

“We are concerned with the growing crime graph against women in our state. We will establish fast track courts in all the district headquarters to ensure speedy delivery of justice to victims,” she said after taking charge of her departments.

Warjri, moreover said, there is need to inculcate “moral values” to school children. “There is a need to strengthen the teaching of moral science as a subject as a measure to curb crime against women in the state.” she suggested.

Moreover, militancy in another problem that needs to be tackled. Various banned insurgent outfits are continuing with their extortions, kidnapping and killings in different parts of the state and therefore maintaining the law and order is a challenge.

Warjri has replaced senior Congress leader HDR Lyngdoh, who earlier held the portfolio in the previous Meghalaya United alliance Government.  “I am totally committed to the task that I have been assignment,” she said about the job at hand.