is the traditional chieftain who acts as a public authority on local judicial and administrative matters within the jurisdiction of the Khasi Hill Autonomous District Council.

As proof, Singh said that he has a letter issued by the Syiem of Mylliem in 2008 to the chairman of the Meghalaya State Electricity Board in which the village chief acknowledges that his predecessors had alloted the Dalit community a plot of land after the Raja of Mylliem entered into an agreement with the British government on December 10, 1863, to establish Civic and Military Sanitaria in the area.

After Independence, members of the community continued to be employed as sweepers and toilet cleaners by the Shillong Municipal Board, state government offices, hospitals, Cantonment Board and the police. “No one objected to usSikh community from Punjabi Line, which is also known as Sweepers’ Colony. In the 1970s, the district commissioner had issued members of the settlement an eviction order. But this was stayed in 1986 by the Shillong bench of the Guwahati High Court. Over the years, groups like the Khasi Students’ Union and the Federation of Khasi Garo Jaintia People have often called for the Punjabi settlers to be evicted from this part of town.

In past years, the community has approached the National Commission of Scheduled Castes and the National Commission for Minorities against attempts to evict them. It also filed a public interest appeal in the High Court, citing the Constutional right of Indian citizens to move freely through the country and live wherever they choose to.

Singh alleged