In the last about 20 years of the Council’s existence, the situation in Darjeeling hills reached point of no return. Many of the tea gardens were closed down and entire cinchona plantation has been literally discontinued. In Dooars for the first time tea workers were dying “hunger deaths”. Most traditional means of livelihood had been uprooted. There were reports of several incidents of hunger deaths, suicides, trafficking of minor girls and large scale migration to urban areas. Environmental degradation led to the deprivation of the residents of Darjeeling, Kurseong and Kalimpong not getting drinking water for months together and the rampant construction of unauthorized buildings upon public properties such as toilets. Never before had the Darjeeling hills witnessed such rampant exploitation of its natural resources including its rich and diverse forests. Scandal after scandal broke out including the infamous Sarva Sikhsha Abhiyan scam where crores of rupees intended for poor and needy primary schoolchildren vanished into thin air whilst those responsible went scot free.

The DGHC has never made any development plans except the one in 1989. It was allowed by the State Government to draw and utilize funds on a purely ad hoc basis. No one knew the annual budget. There were blatant violations of institutional norms and rules of accountancy leading to total disorientation of development in the hills. That the Chairman and Councillors of the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council fattened themselves in the process at the same time enjoying the patronage and protection of the Government of West Bengal is common knowledge.

There were serious instances of political violence where even dissident Councillors were murdered, and the intelligentsia and media intimidated and gagged. The village level Panchayat system was allowed to languish in total doldrums even to this day. Social, political, cultural and literary institutions- real heritage of the hills- were systematically demolished, being treated as they were as sources of collective and community threats. For the ninth consecutive year elections to the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council were not held.

The West Bengal Government highly content with the situation continued to patronise Subash Ghisingh who was totally co-opted and had surrendered the demand for separate statehood and compromised on all the major aspirations concerning the people. It was a win-win situation for the Bengal Government as it did not need to share any development resources, authority and functions with a weak and beleaguered Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council. It only needed to partially and timely lubricate its corrupt machinery out of public funds. For years together the Left Front Government maintained that there were no opposition parties in Darjeeling and thus rendered Ghisingh omnipresent and invincible.

2005-2007- In order to rejuvenate his regime and to distract public attention from the rot and deterioration, the Government of West Bengal and Subash Ghising hit upon the idea of imposing a new governance under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. A tripartite Memorandum of settlement was signed between West Bengal Government, Union Government and the Subash Ghising on the 6th December 2005, a hurried and artificially document put together for the occasion. But nothing could conceal the odour therein of a deep rooted conspiracy to divide the people of the hills and fragment the society into pieces. Subhash Ghising never consulted the people of the hills, the political parties, the social organisations and any civil society organs. As history proved later, it appears that he didn’t even consult his oracles and shamans for this very document proved to be the engine of his downfall.

The oppressed and deprived populace of Darjeeling and the Dooars took to the streets vehemently protesting and opposing the proposed Sixth Schedule bill. There were massive rallies and hunger strikes in Darjeeling district when the Bills were introduced in the Parliament during the winter session of 2007. Despite such protests the West Bengal Government and the Left Front partners appeared bent upon getting these Bills passed. It was only when the Sixth Schedule Bills were referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs that the voice of the people of Darjeeling and Dooars was finally heard and the pernicious documents were kept in abeyance.

2008 - The movement for a separate state of Gorkhaland comprising Darjeeling District and Dooars region of Jalpaiguri intensified once again under the stewardship of Gorkha Janmukti Morcha and the people, institutions and political parties are united in a determined fight to get separate statehood for the region. Subhash Ghising was forced to step down from his then post of Administrator of the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council which is now under the care of a senior bureaucrat of the State Government. Though the Panchayats continued to languish without elections, corrupt and comprador elements in the urban civic bodies were forced to step down in the face of popular resentment and disapproval.