Manipur News

By N. Arunkumar
Be honest with Sincerity….
The truth will set you free. …
Violence against humans and humanity is as old as the first footsteps of mankind on this planet. There have been eras of course, when man did relax in the magnificence of peaceful co – existence, which gave rise to our great achievements in arts and cultural heritage. Great works of art in terms of paintings, literature, poetries and music were created during moments of peace and tranquillity in the lives of people. Those eras of peace are often referred to as the Golden Eras by us even today. We are of course at a disadvantage however, as we cannot experience those nuances of the Golden Era in our own age, in spite of technological intensity and, colossal achievements in the field of information deluge as well as easy logistics of physically reaching far and wide instantly.

We can fly today, from one corner of the world to the other in a matter of hours. Our power to exchange cultural facts with fellow man from other parts of the world, using the advanced communication equipments at our disposal are greatly improved today. Our abilities to propagate these information’s for our own enrichment has also grown much better today. And yet, we continue to face threats in terms of terrorism, wars and disputes that can actually be effortlessly resolved without bloodshed, if we contemplate on the universality of mankind. But no, man loves the colour of hot liquid crimson. Especially the atypical ones from among the typical ones in our midst love the colour of scarlet.

The terrorist is a different genre of human being altogether. Most of them are robotic in their thought process due to their minds being under control of their vicarious masters. A man or woman getting ready to blow up themselves to smithereens for a greater cause has been a staple diet for them. How many of them have really changed the way the world is today; or how their cause has been served is known only to us, who are alive after having witnessed such events in our lifetime. The World Trade Centre attacks, at the beginning of this century had threatened to be like a cauldron that would generate a vast world war at that time. Yet, nothing of the sort happened as America went about with a clinical method of negating a few of the terrorist masterminds in the form of Saddam Hussein and, lately the much hyped Osama Bin Laden. But, was Saddam really a terrorist? I am yet to be convinced about this particular murder by the Americans. And, the debate on that is very much alive. Where are his speculated WMD’s? Weapons of Mass Destruction!

Osama had been given a larger than life portrait by the media, due mainly on account of his support for the fomenters of trouble to governments across the globe, on real or imagined persecution of Muslims everywhere. Their arguments have always been that the ill treatment meted out to the followers of Islam calls for the Jihad, a religious form of crusade to uphold the true values of Islam. The prophet Mohammed (PBUH) had never actually preached violence in his lifetime or in the saying’s of the Holy Koran. The perpetrators of violence however continue to believe that it is a holy duty on their part to continue to blow up people, places and things in the name of protecting their ideologies. The ones, who prompt them to do so, are always their masters who never come out in the open. They send these pawns to the death row, quite effortlessly, while they continue to live their lives happily in air – conditioned comforts.

Many a learned scholar of Islam has condemned these acts and continues to do so, on a regular basis. However, all such mercenary individuals are pawns in the hands of arms dealers and clandestine arms manufacturers who continue to play havoc with the principles of human dignity and sell their weapons of destruction to them and enrich themselves with the wealth gotten from violence thereof. It is an industry that thrives on many false notions of ideologies and they are laughing their ways to the banks while the poor misguided souls lie torn to pieces on the streets of the world. Those who send them to their gory deaths are none but the secret agents of these arms dealers, masquerading as heads of various ideological schools of thoughts.

They are to be blamed for creating much bloodshed among mankind. The religious texts by themselves do not stoke violence or killings, as that is not the context of their viewpoint at all. Not a single religious text written in the world worships violence of the nature we see today. In the present instance, we can say that the violence being staged in the world is of a cosmetic nature, destined to keep the arms manufacturers busy with their trade. The recruits for them are also as easy as it can come, with so much of discontent everywhere in the civilized world of ours as it is.

And, surrender by brainwashing or mind control is an art that has been perfected to an occupation, by a few. The weaklings in our society are also the ones who allow themselves to be easily coerced into believing that the immoral is moral, even though they may be doctors, engineers, scientists or mere casual labourers. The WTC mercenaries were educated pilots and engineers who wreaked havoc on that devastating September 11, a decade ago, now rephrased as 9/11 by the imaginative Americans.

Often that is the reason we look at the perpetrators of such violence in awe. How could they do something like that, we ask ourselves. The answer is simple. The minds of all of us are different and react to situations differently at all times. Our perceptions differ and it is well nigh impossible to find a common thread that will unite our thoughts together. Human beings are forever enigmatic. It is this that makes life so unpredictable and uncertain. These same people who share a public transport, a public lunch, or even a party together with us can be the carriers of the germ of hatred, not clearly visible to themselves also. They are programmed to believe in the other moral, which for the rest of us is definitely immoral. 

The most hardcore of these brainwashed robotic killers come from the dreaded Islamic Hamas in Palestine, and they are really ruthless in the extent of the damage they inflict on innocent humanity around them. They are fighting a legitimate cause undoubtedly, and can be accorded the status of a war. But the Israeli – Muslim conflict is nothing new to the history of humanity. They have been fighting ferociously since long ago, and Israel is a recent entity, fighting for survival too. So the fight is evenly balanced. And both parties know that it is legally acceptable to fight like that. The Israeli response to any Palestinian attack on their citizens is equally ruthless. Hence, the equations are well balanced, calling for American policing in a mild manner to favour the Israelis. After all, the biggest business owners in the USA and other parts of the world are the Israelis, known more popularly by their religious creed, as Jews. The rest is history, as they say.

Now, these are the same men who continue to encourage violence in our midst, as a means of achieving Utopian dreams of peace and progress. It can never happen! Peace is as elusive as the brightness of day meeting the darkness of night on common grounds. As long as education does not teach us the reality, and history does not talk the truth, we shall continue to live in fool’s paradise, which is where we are today. Believe me! The Devil is ruling the roost! Challenge me on that, and you shall win. Because, the lie is always stronger than the truth!

Read more / Original news source: http://kanglaonline.com/2011/09/lies-stronger-than-truths/

By  G.S. Oinam
Today, the kuki are hardly remembered as the same people who had played prominent roles at various juncture of history. They are the people whose past had been a story of warlords, Chieftains, heroic struggles and sacrifice. They are perhaps denied the place they deserve in the history, particularly of the recent past. Perverted minds have projected the Kukis as a people with no significant history. This is utter nonsense, and rather a manipulation of historical facts. The Kukis should be given a fair deal before such distortion of history crosses the limit. There is hardly any serious acknowledgement of the existence of kuki living space or lebensraum. This might be owing to lack of information or lack of enthusiasm on the part of academics and others concerned. 

Kuki lebensraum is the ‘land of freedom’, a land where one can freely move about. The linguistic survey of India, Vol. III, part III, by G.A. Grierson, published in 1904 by government of India, provides a general idea of the geographical spread of kukis’ living space. An excerpt is reproduced as follows: 

Territory inhabited by the kuki tribes extends from the Naga Hills in the North down into the Sandoway district of Burma in the south; from the Myattha River in the east, almost to the Bay of Bengal in the west. 

Who are the Kukis? 
The tribes Aimol, Anal, Chiru, Chongloi, Chothe, Hangsing, Doungel, Gangte, Guite, Haokip, Hmar, Kipgen, Kom, Lhungdim, Lamkang, Lunkim, Changsan, Lenthang, Thangeo, Kolhen, Lhangum, Lhanghal, Milhem, Maring, Mate, Mozo-Monshang, Paite, Sitlhon, Lhouvum and Singsit, Simte, Baite Tarao, Touthang, Vaphei, Zou, etc., may loosely be put under one egalitarian ethnic entity called Kukis. 

However, some of these tribes mentioned above have been assimilated into Naga. This is because of a fear psychosis perpetrated by the bloody ethnic cleansing carried out by the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN-IM). However, they are racking back their genealogy to define themselves as Kuki or Naga. 

Freedom and Sovereignty was what Kukis possessed in their land. Their territory stretch from the Chindwin River in the east, the Naga Hills in the north, North Cachar Hills in the west and the Chittagong hill tracts in the south. Until about a century ago these hills were not largely populated. The Kukis reigned supreme over these hills and moved about freely as an eagle in flight. 

The erstwhile kuki lebensraum, as indicated earlier, still remains identifiable. By signing the treaty of 1834, the British handed over a huge part of it to Burma (Myanmar), only in order to appease the Burmese king. The kukis resisted the British advance into the Chittagong hills and lower Assam during 1840s to 1860s. But they could not withstand the colonial might and were pushed into the eastern interiors. Nevertheless, every now and then the kukis continued to menace the British imperialistic designs. Therefore, the British instituted a boundary commission to weaken kuki, and so ignoring their living space, demarcation between Manipur (India) and Burma came into effect in 1898. By this demarcation the kukis were put under two separate administrations and their territory was dismembered 

During First World War, the Kukis started rising with a new vigour against the British, whish lasted for here years (1917-1919). This time, too, the kukis could not do any substantial damage to the mighty British Empire. They suffered untold miseries and vigorous repression at the hands of the British. Then, in the early 1940’s, hundreds of kukis joined the Indian army (I) and fought the British, yet again. More than one hundred and fifty INA (Indian National Army ) pensioners are still alive. 

Both India and Burma were given political emancipation in 1947. Even then the same political dispensation of the British raj continued. Administrative arrangements of the previous colonial regime became the edifice upon which the new orders were built. The boundary lines of the new nations and their states fragmented the entire kuki lebensraum. This is a tragic reality. To make matters worse a series of ill conceived, half-hearted, myopic, legislations and policies made things worse for the kukis, both in India and Myanmar. 

The state law and order restoration committee (SLORC) of Myanmar have been exacting forced labour from the kukis in the Kabow Valley. Many kukis have been dispossessed of their land by the Myanmar army; for instance, waksu village was completely wiped out in 1992. In 1967, the government of the revolutionary council, headed by Ne-Win, severely punished 20,000 kukis in the ‘Khadawmi operation’. This operation, which was led by U Muangi, was carried out under the pretext that these kukis were holding bogus national registration and family registration cards. 

Consequently, many kukis were forced to leave Burma even though they were natives of the country. In the beginning of 1993, Nung Kam , a kuki village was burnt and bulldozed, and in its place, ‘Saya San Ywo’, a new military settlement was set up. The ostensible reason for this was that kukis refused to convert to Buddhism. The kuki students’ democratic front, Burma, has been highlighting these human rights violations committed by SLORC. All these incidents of harassment and discrimination by the Myanmar military regime have been a matter of great concern. 

In the recent past the Kukis entered a most gloomy phase when the NSCN-IM started its ethnic cleansing campaign against them, particularly in the hills of Manipur. This process of ethnic cleansing, which began in 1992, wiped out hundreds of Kuki villages and eliminated over a thousand innocent Kukis. The victims included prominent Kuki Chiefs, leaders and educated youths. This was perhaps done as a strategy to instill a kind of fear psychosis in the minds of all the Kukis. 

The NSCN-IM also extracted land tax from the Kukis, even though they had inhabited the land since time immemorial. One can easily verify this truth from the folk tales and legends of the Meiteis, Mizos, Awas (Burmese), Tripuris and Ahoms (Assamese). 

Discontentment, sufferings and frustration led the Kukis to resort to armed resistance. But, they are a people who really love to live in peace and dignity. They believe in communal harmony whether it is in the Indian states of Manipur, Nagaland, Assam, Tripura, Mizoram or in Myanmar (Burma). 

Kukis armed insurgency movement is the result of cummulative effect of Naga insurgency coupled with its integration movement in North-East. Issues on Naga’s territorial integration have created a serious problem in Kukis integrity in north-East. Now, kukis are tracing back their genealogy with the help of Culture, Folk-tales etc. They can’t forget age old Naga- Kuki clashes and ethnic cleansing. Any attempt to pamper Nagas at the cost of Kuki’s interest will not be tolerated and may lead only to violent uprising. Home Ministry should put up the Kuki’s problem on the table before Centre and NSCN (IM) peace talk. Only then, Centre can regain the gradually losing faith of peace loving Kukis. 

In Conclusion: 
Kuki identity should be protected, Kuki dignity should be maintained, 
Kuki socio-politico-economic rights should be safeguarded, 
Kuki tradition and culture should be respected, and above all 
Kuki Lebensraum must be recognized. 
Then, and only then, will the Kukis be able to live in peace and dignity in their Lebensraum, i.e. between Chindwin (Myanmar) and Brahmaputra (India).

Read more / Original news source: http://kanglaonline.com/2011/09/kuki-lebensraum/