Jotsoma Youth Organisation (JYO) has agreed to withdraw its ultimatum of stopping water supply to Kohima following a request from the chief secretary.
This was disclosed by Jotsoma Village Council (JVC) chairman Rüdolie Nagi and secretary Rüdosielie Peseyie. In a statement, JVC also thanked JYO for taking up the issue and appealed to the public not to take it otherwise as the issue was not only for the village but for the betterment of society, particularly for the student community as majority of students of Government Higher Secondary School, Jotsoma are from outside the village. JVC also thanked Keneizhakho Nakhro MLA. The two also expressed gratitude to chief minister Neiphiu Rio for his mature and able leadership in solving the impasse over the issue of development of Government Higher Secondary School, Jotsoma and appointment of Grade IV staff under PHED which had been unfulfilled for the last 45 years.
JVC hoped that public too would appreciate the hardships and sacrifices that villagers made for the betterment of society over the years. While noting that Jotsoma village has been bestowed with many natural resources which the villagers readily share with neighbouring villages and the State Capital, JVC said old folks still narrate how they suffered in late 1950s and early 1960s when they were used as forced labour to lay down pipes for water supply to Kohima, as a punishment since some prominent underground leaders were from the village.
It said the labourers neither received wages nor any other incentive from the government, yet silently carried out the tasks of laying pipes through the mountainous terrains for water supply to Kohima.
After Nagaland attained Statehood in 1963, JVC said the situation normalised and, with increased urbanisation, the State government requested the village for more water. JVS said Jotsoma willingly allowed PHED to tap water from Dzüna and Kelorü streams, two lifelines of the village. Accordingly, the department laid bigger pipes and constructed a reservoir at Phezhu, Jotsoma for the purpose and which was inaugurated in 1976.
While inaugurating the project, it said the state government made certain commitments for development of the village, that included upgrade of Jotsoma ME School to Government High School and construction of additional infrastructure like additional buildings and quarters for the school, a full-sized playground, etc. JVC said the government also committed to appoint villagers to suitable Grade-IV posts. JVC expressed gratitude to the State government for upgrading the ME School to Government High School in 1978 as committed and housed the school in the same building constructed in 1968. It said that the school was again upgraded to Higher Secondary School with Arts and Commerce streams in 2014 but however regretted that not a single classroom was added to the existing structure of ME School.
Further, as committed in 1976, it said about 18 villagers were appointed to Grade IV posts yet, on their retirement, no one was appointed against the vacancies. Seeing all these, JVC stated that the village council and youth had been representing the authorities to fulfil the commitments. It was only after the intervention of Keneizhakho Nakhro MLA, that the State government finally convened a joint meeting with JYO on March 19, 2020 wherein certain action plans to address the commitments made in 1976 were decided and to review the action taken after every three months.
However, inaction on the part of the department even to go for joint verification added salt to the injury, resulting in JYO serving the ultimatum on December 18, JVC explained.
Understanding the gravity of the situation, JVC said the chief minister immediately intervened and reassured to develop the school with additional buildings for classrooms and other infrastructure within the next financial year. The reassurance was made at a meeting with the villagers on February 1, during which Rio further committed to create 12 Grade IV posts to be reserved for the villagers, besides sharing the revenue earned through water supply with the village.