Manipur News

By Garga Chatterjee

The most successful tyranny is not the one that uses force to assure uniformity, but the one that removes awareness of other possibilities, that makes it seem inconceivable that other ways are viable, that removes the sense that there is an outside. `”Allan Bloom

When there is a festival, it may create an illusion as if the `whole world`™ is happy at this moment. Or so we like to think. Solitary wails cannot be heard above the sea of laughter. For a certain segment of inhabitants of the Indian Union, the US elections are a `must-follow`. The drama this year will end sometime in November. November will also mark hopelessness in a part of this subcontinent. Irom Sharmila Chanu, the Gandhi that Gandhi never was, has already been continuing 15 years of her epic fast, protesting the torture perpetrated by the armed wing of the Indian state in Manipur, especially in the cover of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA). And she is not finished, yet. She may get 12 more years. I sincerely hope not.

A major part of the reason why the cries of Manipuri women, as exemplified by Irom Sharmila Chanu, can be ignored is the purported `insignificance`™ of Manipur in the `national`™ scene. This `national scene`™ effectively came into being in the Indian Union after the Republic was proclaimed in 1950. Even before the Indian Union was a Republic, it had managed to dismiss the democratically elected government of Manipur led by the Praja Shanti party. The Congress had fought the elections of Manipur and lost. Manipur, with an elected government and at that point not an integral part of the Union, was annexed by the Union of India, which was still not a Republic. Original sins often create particularly bad ulcers. Excision is not an option for a `modern nation state`™. Hence `insignificant`™ ulcers bleed on as the rest of the body is on pain-killers, reading history and civics dutifully from official textbooks.

The focus on the US presidential election also focused the minds of some desis on to the two other elections happening in the USA at the same time `“ those to the US Congress and the US Senate. Let us understand a few things carefully. The US Congress is analogous to the Lok Sabha of the Indian Union. But the USA is a nation constituted by a more real commitment to federalism rather than a semantic charade in the name of federalism. Hence its upper house, the US Senate is not analogous to the Rajya Sabha of the Indian Union. In the lower house in both USA and the Indian Union, the numbers of seats are meant to be proportional to the population. This represents that strand of the nation-state that gives precedence to the whole. This whole is ahistorical and is a legal instrument, though much time and money is spent in the Indian Union to create a fictional past of this legal form. The upper house in the USA represents that strand where past compacts and differing trajectories and identities are represented in the form of states. The states form the `United`™ States of America `“ hence in the Senate the unit is the state, not the individual citizen. That is why in the US Senate, each state, irrespective of population, has 2 members. This respects diversity of states and acts as a protection against the domination of more populous states and ensures that smaller states are respected and are equal stake-holders of the Union. In the Indian Union, the so-called `Rajya Sabha`™ is simply a copy of the Lok Sabha, with multiple staggered time offsets. Even in the Rajya Sabha, the seats allotted to each state are roughly proportional to its population `“ and hence at its core does not represent any different take on the Indian Union. In the Sabha of the Rajyas, the Rajyas are not the unit, making a mockery of the name itself. Manipur has 1 representative in a Rajya Sabha of 245 members. Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura altogether have 7 members in that Rajya Sabha. No group thinks of themselves as `lesser people`™ for being fewer in number. A federal democratic union is not only for the children of Bharatmata. It is a way of having a joint family with many mothers, for no one`™s mata is less important than my mata.

This pattern is replicated all across the subcontinent. When one looks to the west, one sees the autonomy of the Khanate of Kalat being usurped unilaterally as part of the `One Unit`™ scheme, again by a fresh Pakistan state that itself did not possess a republican constitution. And there too, one sees a festering ulcer that bleeds intermittently. Sweeping powers given to the Frontier Corps do not help. Nor do the extra-judicial killings and torture of young Baloch activists help. Piercing an ulcer with a dirty knife risks a general blood poisoning. Every missing person, every body-less head, every tortured torso that `appears`™ by the highway in Balochistan makes the lofty pronouncements about human rights made from Islamabad that much more hollow. And even if the Baloch decided to try to democratic path, what can they do in a system where they count for less than a tenth of the seats, in the national assembly. In November, the extra-ordinary powers of the Frontier Corps were extended in Balochistan again. Maintaining `law and order`™ is the universal answer to all protestations `“ that same cover that the British used to beat brown people into pulp. If the brutal actions of the Frontier Corps as well as the impunity enjoyed by themselves sounds familiar across the border, it is because their colonial cousins in Khaki also have a similar record of glory. It is this impunity that has broader implications. Live footages of Sarfaraz Shah`™s killing or Chongkham Sanjit`™s murder will not lead to anyone`™s pension being withheld. Behind the scenes, there might well be pats on the backs for the `lions`™.

It is useful to understand why it is in the best interest of a democratic Union that the Rajya Sabha be constituted on a fundamentally different paradigm than the Lok Sabha, rather than replicating it. In contrast to the `whole`™ viewpoint, the regions of the Indian Union and Pakistan have diverse pasts, some of which have hardly ever been intertwined with the `centre`™, however defined. This also means that concerns, aspirations and visions of the future also differ based on a region`™s perceived attitude towards a monolithic `whole`™. A federal democratic union is one that does not discriminate between aspirations and is rather flexible enough to accommodate differing aspirations. Rather than using `unity in diversity`™ as an anxious mantra of a paranoid monolith, one might want to creatively forge a unity whose first step is the honest assessment of diversity by admitting that the Indian Union or Pakistan are really multi-national nation-states.

Irom Sharmila`™s struggle is failing partly because in this fight for dignity of the Manipuri people, the subcontinental constitutions drowns the voice of the victim in the crowd of the apathetic and the indifferent, inside and outside the legislative chambers of Delhi and Islamabad. Violence then becomes a way to be heard above the high decibel ritual chants of the `idea of India`™ or `fortress of Islam`™ or `Jinnah`™s Pakistan`™. Ideologically vitiated `national`™ school syllabi and impunity of military forces do not produce unity `“ it produces a polarization between unity and diverse dignities. There is no unity without the constitutive parts`™ dignity. Hindi majoritarianism or Punjabi-Urdu majoritarianism may not appear so to its practitioners but from the vantage of the step-children of the majoritarian nation-state, the world looks very different. When such questions are raised in the subcontinent, one may see tacit agreement or opposition. As far as the opposition goes, it is important to make a few mental notes. Is the person who opposes the idea for whatever reason, from Delhi/Islamabad/Lahore or broadly from North India / West Punjab? Also, has the concerned person lived most of their adult life in a province different from where his/her grandfather lived. If the answer to either if this is yes, there is a high likelihood that the pattern of response to questions raised in this piece will be of a certain kind. Inherent majorities with the noblest of democratic pretensions end up forming imperious centres in the name of a union. A democratic union of states takes into cognizance the subcontinent as it is, not the subcontinent that delhiwallas and isloo/lahorewallas would want it to be like.

A point often made by legal honchos of the subcontinent is that neither Pakistan nor the Union of India is a union of states in the same way the United States of America is. What they mean is that these nation-states did not come into being due to some agreement or treaty between states. Rather they maintain that the states/provinces are arbitrary legal entities/ instruments created by the respective constitutions for administrative ease. What such a reading aims to do is to delegitimize any expression of aspiration of the states/provinces that may not be in line with the centre. How can an arbitrary legal entity created by central fiat and also alterable by fiat have autonomous will? This legalese collapses in the face of sub-continental reality where states/provinces as they exist today are broadly along ethno-linguistic lines. These entities are along ethno-linguistic lines (and more are in the pipeline in Seraiki province or Telegana) because `administrative`™ units can only be arbitrary to a point, irrespective of the total arbitrariness that constitutions permit. The ethno-linguistic ground-swells are real, aspirations to homeland are real, and since the capital cities do not have enough experimental chambers to convert all inhabitants into `nothing but Indian`™ or `nothing but Pakistani`™, these are here to stay and do not seem to have any immediate plans of committing suicide. While the specific drawing of the lines may be arbitrary (something that applies to the whole nation-state too), that in no way makes the reality of ethno-linguistic community habitats vanish. A legal stranglehold that denies this reality also ends up denying that the subcontinent existed before the constitutions were drawn up. If the BritIsh didn`™t happen to the subcontinent, and if one or more large nation-states had to happen in the subcontinent, such entities would have been due to agreements between different near-sovereign entities. That states/provinces did not have such agency to make such a compact in 1947 is a legacy of British rule. Ironically, such a scenario bequeathed from the British is the bedrock of the post-colonial nation-states of Pakistan and the Indian Union. Both like to call themselves federal, for no one else calls them so.

A creative re-conceptualization of the distribution of representation and power in the Indian Union as well as Pakistan may show that one does not necessarily need to choose between the unity and diversity. Accounting for more than a sixth of humanity and a serious breadth of non-domesticated diversity, that subcontinental experiment is worth doing, irrespective of its outcome. A people`™s democratic union is not only feasible but also humane. For far too long, bedtime stories commissioned by the state have been read out in schools and in media outlets, so that our deep metropolitan slumber is not interrupted by real nightmares in rougher parts. But there are just too many truths to spoil the myth.

Read more / Original news source: http://kanglaonline.com/2015/08/from-the-vantage-of-the-stepchildren-of-the-majoritarian-nationstate-the-world-looks-very-different/

By Dr. Th Ranjit

The Meeteis settling in the central valley districts of the state and elsewhere are the aborigines or originals settlers of the state, like the Tankhuls, Kabuis, Maram, Mao, Kom, Vaiphei, etc., the recognized Scheduled Tribes of India, among the Mongoloids (Kirats) race of the North East India. This fact is proven by the Anthropologists and Historians `“ present and past, Indians and non-Indians, literates and illiterates alike, since a long time till date. There is no doubt about the Meeteis belonging to a tribe or indigenous people of the state. None can challenge the veracity of it. After the historical tragic incident of forced conversion of Meeteis into Hinduism during the reign of king Pamheiba/Garibniwaz (1709-1748), they have been treated as Hindus/Aryans instead of Mongoloids, because of the fact that only the Aryans can embrace Hinduism according to Swami Vivekananda.

In fact, Meeteis continued to be a major tribe in the official British records till Manipur merged into Indian Union in 1949. In 1891 census, Manipuris (Meeteis) were recorded as forest tribe; 1901 census, main tribe and 1931 census, Hindu Tribe but retaining their distinctive language and culture. But after the merger of Manipur into Indian Union and subsequent to the formation of new Republic of India on 26th January, 1950, the tribal status of the Meeteis was abruptly dropped and enlisted in the general caste/category without giving valid reasons to the Govt. of Manipur, owing to the unholy influence of some Manipuri Hindu fanatics and some political leaders having vested interests in the persons of Shri Lalita Madhav Sharma, Banka Bihari Sharma and Sinam Khrishnamohon, the so called scholars of that time. Consequently, the social chasm between valley people and hill people that was created in 18th century, when the former was converted to Hinduism ,was further deepened due to the categorization of the people of the State as general, ST and SC by the constitution of India, in addition to the British policy of divide and rule between hills and plains.

As the valley of Manipur was formed from a big lake in the geologic past ,due to the siltation of organic matters and sediments from the surrounding hill ranges, is very fertile and very suitable for agricultural activities for a long time. In fact, agricultural products of this small fertile valley districts are largely contributing to the livelihood of the people of the state, both hill and plain, poor and rich, indigenous and non -indigenous and so on. But, this small portion of arable land, occupying 5% (approx.) of the total geographical area of the state, is giving shelters and foods to about 70% of the total population of the state. Unfortunately, this so important plain area of the state, peopled mostly by the Meeteis, is not protected by the Indian Constitution, that is, anybody in India can purchase or own land in this so precious land of the people of the state. In the hill districts, on the contrary, no people belonging to the general category/caste, (say,Meeteis, Biharis, Marwaris, Bengalis,etc.) can buy land and settle there as the lands are protected under Scheduled V of the Indian Constitution.

As we all know, the fertile land of the valley districts, very good for agricultural pursuits, are gradually dwindling due to the faulty policy of the government, procurement of lands by rich people and businessmen in the name of urbanization for construction of buildings, hotels, educational institutions, industrial establishments, stone crushing centres, brickfields, expansion of roads, airport, railway lines by the Govt. etc. If this trend is not checked, there will be hardly any land left for agricultural activities to meet the growing food grains demands, employment avenues of our people in the fields in rural areas of the state and the like in near future. The situation will be grimmer when Indian railway reaches Imphal and Trans Asia Highway passes through the State in the next few years and that the land owned by poverty-stricken and money-poor majority Meetei populace will fall prey to the land hungry business sharks and multimillionaires when they wanted to establish their business centres. In this way, constitutionally unprotected lands of the state, peopled by Meeteis mostly, but producing the maximum agricultural yields of the state will be in the hands of the outsiders or non-indigenous people and as a result of which Meeteis, in particular and other indigenous people in general, will face unprecedented problems in terms of food availability, employment avenues, business opportunities, demographic patterns, social harmony, etc. If the government and people are sensible and sincere enough to utilize our small fertile lands in the valley areas of the state judiciously and purposely, we can save our land, identity, culture, and future generations from being exploited by various greedy, rich, hard working, skilled and organised non-indigenous people coming from outside the state in large measures.

Therefore, in order to save the Meeteis and other indigenous people of the state or sons of the soil from possible food crisis or mass starvation for want of agricultural produces or from possible exploitation by ever increasing influx of people coming from outside the state , the fertile and productive areas of valley districts should be protected under the Indian Constitution, as is done in the hill districts of the State. Restoration of ST status to Meeteis will save our fertile valley, which is producing foods for the total population of state, on one hand and the Meetei tribe from gradual extinction in the next 3-4 decades in his natural habitat, on the other. Not only this, Meeteis can live on generation after generation in his ancestral land with his brethren in the hills and valley in harmony, ethnic equality and peace once again as one tribal society or tribal state as before in the past. Over and above this, Meetei can compete well with the rest of the country in central sectors-educations, jobs, etc. in proper platforms for its rights and opportunities as guaranteed by the Indian Constitution and bring more laurels for the people of the state.

Finally, the realization of Meeteis that they were in higher social status because of their being in general category was nothing but a false pride will be paving a great step forward in fostering peace, development and unity among the indigenous people of the state. The historic comeback of Meeteis`™ to tribal status or old fold, as guaranteed by Indian Constitution, should be seen as `home-coming`™ and should be given warm welcome by other indigenous people of the state and prove to the world that `blood is thicker than water.

Read more / Original news source: http://kanglaonline.com/2015/08/lately-meeteis-realise-blood-is-thicker-than-water/