Williamson Ampang Sangma (18 October 1919 – 25 October 1990), a Garo leader, former Chief Minister of Meghalaya, twenty-first state of India on 21 January 1972. He was also the first ever Governor of Mizoram among the Garos in 1989.
Williamson was a statesman, tribal leader, and a pioneer in leading the struggle for the creation of Meghalaya state.
Biography
Capt. W.A. Sangma was born in Baghmara, South Garo Hills district. He always represented the Baghmara assembly constituency, even after merging his political outfit in Congress(I) party.
He, Salseng C. Marak and Mukul Sangma are the only Meghalaya Chief Ministers to complete full term of five years in office. A biography of Capt. Sangma was written by Mihir N. Sangma.
Hill state movement
With prior military service, Sangma entered political field in 1952, and subsequently was elected as the Chief executive member of the Garo Hills Autonomous District Council (GHADC). On 16 June 1954, the members of the executive committees of the Autonomous District Council of the Garo Hills (GHADC), the Khasi (Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council), Jaintia Hills (Jaintia Hills Autonomous District Council), the Lushai Hills (Mizo Hills), and the North Cachar Hills District Council held a meeting at Shillong, and pleaded for the establishment of a separate Hill state on the ground that there was no adequate safeguard for the preservation of the identity of the hill people in the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution of India. The meeting demanded the creation of a separate state for all the hill areas of Assam, to be called "Eastern Hill State." Accordingly, they, including W.A. Sangma as a Chief sent a set of suggestions for amendment of the Sixth Schedule to the members of Indian parliament.
Though Wilson Reade, chairman of the Khasi National Durba, was the first one to demand a separate hill state, it was Sangma who accelerated the movement successfully. He led the sustained struggle by the Garos, Jaintas, and the Khasis, for the hill state from the 1950s. As first Chief executive member of the Garo Hills Autonomous District Council (GHADC), Sangma called a conference of the people of the autonomous hill districts of then-Assam at Tura on 6–8 October 1954, to consider the demand of a hill state. An appeal was sent to the leaders of all the tribal organisations and parties of the autonomous districts to sign the memorandum. Under his leadership, the conference passed the resolution to submit a memorandum to the States Reorganisation Commission (SRC) for the formation of a separate "Eastern Hills State." The memorandum emphasising the following points was submitted to SRC: The people of the hills and the plains differed from each other. The attempt of the Assamese people to impose their language and culture on the hill tribes. The Assamese dominance in the legislature and the services, and The autonomy granted under the Sixth Schedule was not adequate.
The separate state question become an election issue in the 1957 general elections in Assam. The EITU, United Mizo Freedom Organization (UMFO), the Mizo Union, and the Garo National Union captured a majority of seats giving the impetus and popular mandate for the Hills movement, while the Congress lost—all five seats in the United Khasi-Jaintia Hills, three seats in Garo Hills, and one seat in Mikir Hills and North Cachar Hills. Bimala Prasad Chaliha with confidence from hills people, became the Chief Minister of Assam. In 1957, Sangma was elected to Assam Legislative Assembly. In the following year, he joined the cabinet of Assam to look after the departments of tribal regions, information, publicity, and transport. After the Indian independence, when the Nagas declared war against India, the tribes inhabiting the Khasi-Jhantia-Garo Hills extended co-operation to Government of Assam; as a result, Williamson Sangma was taken in the cabinet of Chaliha, Chief Minister of Assam, as a Cabinet minister in charge of the "Tribal Areas Department." When the Assamese language bill was passed in spite of opposition from tribal people later, he resigned from the cabinet to fight for the cause of separate statehood.