Manipur News

Sharmila’s response to the invitation by Team Anna to join the hunger strike campaign to make the Union government introduce a legislation in Parliament to constitute a statutory people’s ombudsman aimed at curbing official corruption effectively, was measured and mature. The invitation was obviously an afterthought following many comparisons and questions raised in the media about the public clamour over the fast by Anna Hazare and the lack of it in the case of Sharmila who had been on a fast for a record 10 years and still counting. It is unlikely Team Anna did not know the facts of Sharmila’s status as a jail inmate and for this reason it was not totally up to her individual volition to participate in their protest strike in New Delhi. The invitation in this sense was, so to say, a token gesture, or the biblical fig leaf, to cover up what was increasingly becoming an uneasy embarrassment. It was interesting to note how a great section of the media in the Northeast rallied behind Sharmila in varying shades of outrage calling for parity of concern of the Indian public in the two cases. There was also a good section of the national media, lead from the front by Chennai headquartered The Hindu, constantly reminding the Indian public of the difference in their reception of the two cases. Most memorable of all was well known social activist, author of Booker Prize winning novel “God of Small Things” and acknowledged champion of the underdogs in the Indian state’s assimilative nationalising mission, Arundhati Roy, who lent her voice to highlight this discrepancy further. The main thrust of her hard hitting articles derided the public hysteria over the campaign against corruption as this looked only at official corruption and not that of the corporate world or for that matter the corporate media, the indication of which became quite stark after scandals like the infamous Radia tapes expose.

Sharmila was humble in her reply. She wholeheartedly expressed her solidarity with Anna Hazare’s campaign but expressed her inability to join him and his team because of her internship in a Manipur jail. She instead invited Team Anna to visit Manipur, which she described as the most corrupt of all Indian states. Her last jab should have had the sting intended. Manipur must rank as the state with one of the most corrupt official establishment. From the lowly fourth grade employees to the top bosses in the political leadership and bureaucracy, all have collectively and in a collaborative manner, ensured that corruption is entrenched not just into the system but in the psyche of the people. Even the most humble citizen today talks with a clear conscience of the need to pay bribes to get in a child or ward to a government job position as if this was the most natural and only way such things were to be done. Roads and other infrastructures constructed continually are so substandard that they cannot even withstand the onslaught of a single monsoon not because of paucity of funds but because funds were siphoned off into individual pockets. Of such works, there will be no proof needed, as they are plenty of extremely visible examples stark before everybody to see. Corruption in other states is about occasional explosive scandals that break out in high places. Corruption in Manipur, although relatively much less in magnitude, is much more in spread and extend. Indeed it has been made a part of everyday life, therefore endemic and perpetuated endlessly in an unnatural cycle. We hope, even if as just another token gesture, Team Hazare visits Sharmila after their high profile campaign is brought hopefully to a happy conclusion. That would be such a jolt to the corrupt system at in this state. We hope Team Hazare also lends its highly audible voice to Sharmila’s own campaign against the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, AFSPA. They are out there on a campaign to what they believe would ultimately save India but this too is equally about saving the spirit of India.

No argument about it, putting an end to corruption would be a big fillip in the public morale and the economy of the country, considering the estimate that close to 40 percent of the Indian economy is black. But as critics have pointed out sharply and sometimes disparagingly, we hope the campaign also ultimately brings in other forms of corruption other than just the official ones. Corruption happens everywhere including outside the official realms. It includes the ways of cheating small time traders and contactors as well as those who award and approve their cheating ways. The very fact that prices sky rockets every time there is a road blockade or landslide is itself an indication of the cheating ways of many. On all these occasions, essential commodities, in particular petrol and diesel, disappear from the petrol pumps, but nonetheless begin to appear for inflated prices in the black market. How could this happen other than through the vile contagion of corruption?

Read more / Original news source: http://kanglaonline.com/2011/08/two-fasts-too-far-apart/

That Manipur is in a mess today is more or less a truism. Consequently the tearing dilemma the chief minister, Okram Ibobi would be in is also unenviable. Even as the demand for a separate SADAR hills district intensified, with the agitators resorting to blocking off the main lifeline of the state, the Imphal-Dimapur road at Kangpokpi, in anticipation that the agitators may have their way, the United Naga Council, UNC, has imposed its own blockade along all the other highways that lead out of the state, thus effectively cutting off the state from the rest of the country. Thankfully though, Imphal is now very well connected to the rest of the country by air, thus offering some consolation at least for passengers. The widely held anti-valley, anti-Meitei attitudes of hill communities is also making the situation worse, as is evident from some of the press releases by the latter which try to portray the tussle between the SADAR hills district demand and those opposed to it (or more bluntly, between the demand for the creation of a new Kuki dominated district and Nagas’ opposition to it), as machination of the valley people or Meiteis. The most bewildered by this development obviously are the latter.
Under the circumstance, whichever way the chief minster inclines his decision, it is going to be seen as biased, thereby held as a legitimate reason to impose the only thing agitators in Manipur have come to know doing well, impose a blockade, bandh or boycott, all of which essentially mean the same atrocious act of disrupting life of the general public in the hope that this would coerce the government to do the agitators’ biddings. It is not entirely impossible those at the receiving end of this tussle, the valley to be precise, may also begin to lose their patience, and that will be when Manipur returns to the dark ages.

The government at this moment seems clueless as to how to tackle the problem and understandably so too. But this notwithstanding, the situation cannot be allowed to slip any further. If at all the government cannot find a way out quickly, as was suggested by a former president of the ruling Congress party, the emergency constitutional provision under Article 356 must be invoked and President’s Rule imposed in the state. This is not so much about punishing the government for allowing the situation to go out of hand leaving the state with the distinct possibility of completely descending into total chaos, but instead of finding a way out of the present dangerous problem.

It will be recalled there have been examples of what a PR dispensation can do which elected government simply cannot. This is especially so when it comes to matters of mediating or else of taking the state administration into areas that are in opposition of either ethnic or vote bank interests. Central rule being deemed to be neutral to these considerations, it can push sensitive issues much harder. Furthermore its tough gesture would be free from allegations of any valley or hill biases, imaginary or otherwise. The most prominent of these examples is the manner in which the PR government under former Governor, Gen. (retd.) V.K. Nayar, when he undertook the decision to clear the Palace Compound of encroachers from some hill districts who had actually converted the Hapta Polo-ground into a shanty town. No popular government had dared to do this or would have dared it either, because of the ethnic and political implications the action would have carried. There would also have been pulls and pushes from within the government with concerned MLAs opposing the move. The present situation is evolving to be of the nature. Since amidst the bitter ethnic distrusts displayed so far, it would be difficult if not impossible for the present popular government to resolve the crisis, let a PR administration do it. Even if the district creation issue is deferred, the PR administration would be in a much better position to forcefully open up the highways so that life returns to normalcy in the state, and any danger of ethnic tensions escalating is kept under control. The 11th session of the 9th Manipur Legislative Assembly is beginning shortly. If a comprehensive plan to resolve this crisis is not thrashed out during this session, we for one would like to see a resort to the only trump left in hand – Presidents Rule, to tackle the issue. The important point is, a humanitarian crisis resulting out of all these blockades must be avoided at all cost, for the price to be paid if the situation reaches a critical point and tempers explode on the streets everywhere in the state, would be too heavy for everybody.

Read more / Original news source: http://kanglaonline.com/2011/08/is-pr-the-way-out/