Tag: Top Stories

IMPHAL, Sept 8 (NNN): The Manipur State unit of Naga People’s Front (NPF) has expressed concern over the current impasse in connection with the Sadar Hills and said that the total bandh had been lifted but there is no end in sight to the economic blockade while suggesting that United Naga Council (UNC) and its allied organizations should call for a proper consultation among the different Naga tribes and districts for serious introspection. The NPF also advised the Sadar Hills District Demand Committee (SHDDC) members to acknowledge the lack of consensus and first find remedial measures for elimination of apprehension among the different communities in the area.

The NPF then came down on the state government of Manipur saying the latter now apparently seems helpless as it is caught in the vicious web of its own programme and policies. The NPF, Manipur unit accused that the state government`s attempt to appease and placate the innocent public with wishful ideas of creating new districts without properly assessing the ground realities, such as Tonjei Maril (Jiribam), Tengnoupal, Phungyar etc. and the controversial Sadar Hills district is most unfortunate at the fag end of its term. “If creation of Sadar Hills district is really meant for administrative convenience, first why not absorb Jiribam which is under Imphal East but lays 220 kms away west from it, into Tamenglong or Churachandpur districts,” suggested the NPF.

“Therefore the Manipur unit of NPF advises the state government to be truthful to itself and to the people so that any undesirable consequence is avoided in the sate like Manipur. The party then said all parties concerned including the state government must give due importance and respect to the traditional boundaries of any communities, areas and villages while making major decisions such as creation of new districts. The state government must also initiate dialogue with the parties concerned and involve them in such issues with total transparency or altogether shelve the issue temporarily so that time will take its own course, it advised.

Read more / Original news source: http://kanglaonline.com/2011/09/npf-expresses-deep-concern-over-sadar-hills-issue/

By Nameirakpam Bobo MeiteiWhat hope does a state give to its people? The hope that their state is altogether a different establishment in which every individual can claim his or her rights, and if this state turns out to be quite the contrary, and its conducts barely reflecting the wishes of its people, instead of giving hope it has begun to terrorise its very own people, then should people come forward to court a establishment which is willing to treat its people as subjects rather than respectable citizens? When a state has reached a point where no one feels the need to approach it to seek justice and all that it can bestow to those who have empowered them is tyranny should people live on under it?
One academic laid down several questions regarding the conducts of the Indian government in the state of Manipur on removal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act(AFSPA), one among them was “How many people in India know about AFSPA and the existing problem of insurgency in the reason and why people are gung-ho in asking the Act be repealed when they themselves have no solution to the existing insurgency problem?”
Only a clause in the Act is what people need to know, the clause that gives complete immunity to guilty security personnel. While attempting to solve a complex prolonged-matter the state has to be consistent and any fruitful result is for the betterment of the people. But what if their attempts have proved futile while enough damage has been to a people who are caught up in the conflict? What difference can one see between those proscribed groups, the state is fighting supposedly on behalf of the people, and its soldiers, which have been given the task to handle and have turned against those who they have sworn to protect? Should we expect that state agents behave just like those proscribed group or worse than them because they happened to be caught up in a conflict zone?
Here one doesn’t overlook the existing insurgency, while one is asking the Act be repealed from the affected region. One understands that existing problem should be solved, perhaps with a different approach altogether since the old approach of “combat and destroy” doesn’t prove productive, and can expect to be more human; start conducting in a fashion that reflects the wishes of the people, human rights not being violated and if violated they should have faith that justice will be done.Some say why the elected representatives in power don’t say much against it and how they have come back with a majority to power? But why did the government give in the army’s opposition to the removal despite strong recommendation by several committees set up under the behest of prime minister? Even if the state government wished how much of its wish could be carried out when it finds itself in a situation in which New Delhi can easily override state power? If one is to talk about the voting back Ibobi government in Manipur, which didn’t say a word against during election campaigns, one could also question the overall maturity of Indian democracy. Despite the clear knowledge that BJP leaders were responsible for the demolition of Babri Mosque why they have voted back repeatedly in a secular India?
Perhaps India has become a virtual military state in which civilian concerns are no more valued in the regions suffering from insurgency. If India claims that it has the power to destroy external forces at wars then it should also be convinced of its ability to eliminate those elements which have only been considered detrimental, and if it cannot, then perhaps it should reconsider its strategy and try to address the decade-old problem through political means. Unfortunately no serious initiative has come forward from New Delhi except some leaders dropping at election times and scattering few lines asking to “join the mainstream” when those who have been living in the very heart of Delhi from this region don’t feel that they are treated as a part owing to the cast attitudes of the people. One just have to look at the ongoing decade-old peace dialogue between NSCN(I-M) and Delhi, what milestone both the parties have brought forward before a person who was boy when the peace talks started and now the author of this piece?   
If New Delhi wants people from this region to join the so-called “mainstream” perhaps it should value the dignity of those who live in the so-called disturbed zones under the sly shade of Armed Forces Special Power Act. How could a humiliated people come forward to join a “mainstream” which it sees as the violator of their basic fundamental rights and making a mockery of their dignity? 

Read more / Original news source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Kanglaonline/~3/iucKyRGQbYg/

By Amar YumnamManipur is right now facing some veritable issues relating to the development and the management of her capital, the Imphal city. The development issues relate to the environmental (dust, mud and similar pollutions; the noise pollution is yet to enter the thinking of the people of the land), improvement of the existing logistics and infrastructure and amenities, and efforts towards installing new facilities. The management problems are those relating to traffic, clustering of locations and social impact issues of the improvement and development activities.
Impressive Yes: The recent interventions affecting changes in Imphal city are impressive in so far as they relate to improvements of facilities and creation of new amenities.  They are impressive because, for the first time in any development activity in living memory, there are signs of application of mind and social and engineering design commitments in these.
Here we may recall some basic roles of an urban area. Urbanisation in any social context should be a basic foundation for modernisation and technological change. This should also serve as the place for interaction and integrity among the different segments of the population. While endeavouring to play these roles, the basic requirement is not to outgrow itself in which case the possible negative characteristics would outstrip the positive externalities of urbanisation. Once such a stage reaches a critical point, the city becomes a centre of crime and place for absence of rule of law difficult to re-establish governance. In other words, a city can grow only up to a level where it can sustain itself in terms of normal conduct of business, interaction of people and interchange of ideas and provision of access and amenities without compromising on the level of comforts. To all these, we now have a twenty-first century dimension to urban governance, which relates to security; the city should be such that ensuring security and restoration of security atmosphere without much loss of time if once disturbed by terrorist attacks  can be affected.
The recent developmental interventions, post the flyover, indicate efforts to cater to all these requirements of a city. The fiasco, historical and social, of the Imphal flyover seems to have sunk into the minds of the Imphal city planners, and they now seem eager to remedy this by a new set of rationale interventions. To this extent, the new developments and changes are to be lauded.
Management of Changes:   While the developmental interventions are to be appreciated as stated above, we must categorically point out that the management of the changes betray absolute lack of application of mind and streaks of non-democratic orientation. We now seem any instances of putting the cart before the horse in introducing the changes, and a kind of conviction where the police forces are being projected as the sole means for development orientation. Unfortunately, we fail to appreciate why so many violations of the new rules are being committed by the vehicles of uniform personnel and vehicles of ‘very important persons’; all these are dangerous portends for a democracy and instances which can ultimately jeopardise all the good intentions accompanying the recent interventions. If we are effecting urban development, we must also be aware of the global lessons in urbanisation.
We understand that any kind of development intervention would generally have the impact of benefitting some and disturbing the interests of some others. Accordingly, it is important that the governance of the impact be such that the negative impacts be minimised, if not neutralised, and at least conditions are generated for the adversely affected people to bear the temporary adversities without much hardship. But this cardinal lesson seems to have been missed out by the city planners and administrators. One instance-exemplar of the lack of management is the case of the street vendors. It is true that all now existing and those who would be emerging in the future cannot be accommodated in the existing city centre. The clearance of the city centre from their presence is right, but the timing is absolutely wrong. As mentioned above, the street vendors would definitely have to bear the cost of inconveniences when forced out to a new place. However – given the historical, social and economic role of our women- the policy makers should have been alive to the necessities for addressing the adverse impact these women would face when forced to move to Lamphelpat. Before forcing them out to Lamphelpat, all the accesses should have been put in order in the first place, but it is quite the contrary. A marketplace is one where both sellers and buyers can easily access and interact. This fundamental principle has been violated to the core. Further, this has negatively affected in the second round the markets in the greater Imphal areas which were earlier dependent on bulk morning purchases for retailing in the rest of the day. One can easily imagine the kind of bitterness and negative impact these must have generated.
Another instance is the case of traffic management. For the new non-entry and non-parking regulations to be sustainable and thus have lasting effectiveness, it is important that we have a clustering and then zoning approach to the city. This way, we could generate a kind of labour-intensive activity atmosphere in the city while not jeopardising the present approach. Once again, the will has been imposed, and the security agencies have been pressed into a cause for developmental intervention.
Final Comment: In fine, we would definitely like to say that the governance of development in the land and for that matter anywhere needs to be aware of the impact management dimensions of the needed interventions. The lack of this understanding is particularly marked in otherwise good urban interventions in Imphal today post-the flyover. Further, we should now be shedding the entrenched impact of the long existence under the army law where everything is to be controlled by the forces in uniform. What is important in a democracy and thus sustainable is the establishment of a system which people would spontaneously imbibe. Further this system would give no exceptions, as is wont in Manipur to the security forces and the very important persons, for once exceptions are maintained in public domain, the future of democracy is at stake.

Read more / Original news source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Kanglaonline/~3/WE1aUJW30ak/

IMPHAL, May 24: Preparations for the smooth conduct of tomorrow`™s Imphal Municipal Council election in all 27 polling stations under the municipal council is all set with all police personnel deputed by the state for the polling stations already stationed at their respective polling stations since this evening and the arrival of the polling personnel with the Electronic Voting Machines to their respective polling stations.

According to the official reports of concerned election Returning officers of both districts, all the poling personnel equipped with the Electronic Voting Machines along with deputed state security forces which were made to dispersed from the respective DC offices of Imphal at Porompat and DC office of Imphal West at Lamphelpat have reportedly reached their respective polling stations and ready for conducting the election of each and every polling stations of the 27 wards of the Imphal Municipal Council which will start from 7 am till 4 am.

In the meantime with the sending of the polling personnel along with the state security forces to each and every polling stations for the ensuing polls tomorrow the activation of regular patrolling by the deputed police commandos team called up from the different police stations of both districts of Imphal East and Imphal West have initiated their regular petrol duties from this evening in an around the polling stations of both districts to prevent any election related violence prior to the poll.

In the meantime, as per the final official figure the ensuing election to the 27 wards including seven wards in Imphal East districts and 20 wards in Imphal West a total of 88 candidates are contesting for the 27 councillors while 179 candidates are contesting for the 54 WDC members.

According to the report, after proper assessment of the wards conducted by the concerned police in both districts of Imphal West district and Imphal East, it has been found that 26 Polling Stations have been categorized as Hyper Sensitive polling stations, 77 Polling Station as sensitive Polling Stations while the remaining Polling Station are counted as normal. There will be maximum concentration of security forces to the polling stations of Imphal East during the poll hours as the maximum polling stations in Imphal East district are registered Hyper Sensitive as a result the state government has made special security arrangement for the smooth and successful conduct of the election to the polling stations under Imphal East as well as in Imphal West tomorrow.

In the meantime, the state government considering the intensity of election related crimes which are expected to rise during the eve of the poll, decided to deploy 12 state forces including six armed personnel headed by an Inspector or SI along with four VDFs and two women police constable or women home guards each at the hyper sensitive polling stations; 10 armed police personnel headed by Inspector or SI along with three VDFs along with two women police constables or home guards in the sensitive polling stations while there will be provision of seven personnel including three armed and two unarmed VDFs and two women personnel either from Police or Home Guard in normal poling stations.

On the other hand, an official briefing have already been given to all concerned SPs of the valley districts of the state by the DGP Manipur very recently to ensure that the official directives for security arrangement in connection to the May 25 election is properly maintained and the concerned SPs of the valley districts have also given their official directives to all OCs concerned of Police stations and Outposts to made available the security personnel from the concerned PS and OP.

It may be mentioned that with the inaction of Manipur Municipality Act 1994, in the state the election of Municipal Councils in the state was first held during 1995 and followed in 2001, 2006 and the ensuing election will be the fourth election of the Municipal Council during which election of additional two members of Ward Development Committee for every wards will be held along with the election of councilors of the ward as per a recently enacted rule of the state for the proper implementation of development schemes and projects in the wards.

The ensuing election to the Imphal Municipal Council could be a deciding factor for the ruling Congress party in the state for next years general election with about 50 Congress candidates fighting in the IMC election which is the highest amongst the political parties of the state.

Read more / Original news source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Kanglaonline/~3/3jN9sW989s4/

IMPHAL, May 31: `A Working Women`™s Hostel for those hailing from the North Eastern states will be inaugurated in the month of June, 2011 at New Delhi. This will greatly help the working women from the region in terms of safety and comfort`, said Bijoy Krishna Handique, union minister of DoNER at New Delhi today.

According to an emailed statement, the 500 seater working women`™s hostel in Jasola is funded by the ministry of DoNER through the North Eastern Council (NEC) in association with the ministry of Women and Child Development.

According to the statement, the total cost of the project is Rs.17.44 crores wherein the share of NEC is 25%. Land cost for the hostel has been shared between NEC and ministry of Women and Child Development on a 50-50 basis. The minister has been in touch with Krishna Tirath, minister of State for Women & Child Development to make the hostel functional at the earliest.

Handique also said that construction works have progressed to a major extent for another hostel named Rajiv Gandhi Girls Hostel to accommodate 500 Tribal Girl Students from the NER at the Delhi University Campus at a total cost of Rs.23.33 crores jointly shared between NEC and ministry of Tribal Affairs on 60:40 basis. It is likely to be completed within this financial year. It is located at Dhaka Housing Complex, University of Delhi; Banda Bahadur Marg, New Delhi. NEC has already released Rs. 11.50 Crores towards this hostel project, the statement maintained.

Apart from these two hostels, there is already a fully functional 500 seater girls hostel at Delhi University North Campus wholly funded by Ministry of DoNER, the statement added.

Read more / Original news source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Kanglaonline/~3/VbW58MdepcY/

IMPHAL June 3: As a part of the continuing effort of various social organizations of Jiribam to press the state government to convert the Jiribam sub-division into a full fledged revenue district, the Jiribam branch of AMSU, MSF and DESAM, today, organized a peaceful protest rally starting from Jiribam higher secondary school at around 11. 30 am.

Around 400 students from Kalinagar high school, Kasturba high school, Jiribam higher secondary school and R.K. Sanatombi Vidyalaya high school, Jiribam participated in the said rally.

Later in the day, the Jiribam district demand committee had called a 30 hours general strike in Jiribam sub division which will be effective from the mid-night of June 6 till 6 am of June 8 as a response to the concerned authority`™s mute stand.

A press conference that was held at around 2.30 pm at the temporary office of the committee which is situated in the office of MSF, Jiribam branch also highlighted the further course of actions if the government continue to fail to act accordingly even after repeated demands. In this regard the convener of the committee, Mutum Meipaksana Mangang has appealed the general populace in the Jiribam area for their support till the demand of converting the sub-division into a district is materialized.

The committee further cautioned the state government that an economic blockade for 5 days starting from 7pm of June 11 till 7 pm of June 15 will be instituted on the Imphal Jiribam state highway as a further course of action, if the government fail to give any positive responses even after the stipulated time. The committee further appealed to all the vehicles plying on this highway to fully cooperate during the proposed economic blockade.

Read more / Original news source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Kanglaonline/~3/Hqq2XlWDY00/