8/14/2019 Kapil Arambam Through the Looking Glass of a Pacifist

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8/14/2019 Kapil Arambam Through the Looking Glass of a Pacifist

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strength and the country is least prone to military coup in Latin

America. The culmination o a revolutionary process reunited

and transormed a shattered China. Likewise, decolonising and

neocolonial countries, such as, Cuba and Vietnam have broken

the chains o extreme dependency. We have also seen the loty

ideals o Liberty, Fraternity and Equality fring imaginations in the

quest o social and national liberation.

It might be superfcial to compare these enhanced national

powers to a region like ours. The resistance is completing fve

decades and it is worrying, the label o being a ailed state is going

to be attached or ever. It is an open secret how these insurgents

are operating with mass extortion, and armed movement has been

devalued shamelessly as a business enterprise. What is to become

o Manipur?

Ted Gurr elaborated in Why Men Rebel that political violence

occurs when many people in society become angry. And people

become angry when there occurs a gap between the valued

things and opportunities they eel entitled to and the things and

opportunities they actually get a condition known as relative

deprivation.

But there are basic counter-arguments, which are convincing

and easily specifed. No matter how discontented an aggregate

o people may become, they cannot engage in political action,

including violence, unless they are part o organised groups with

access to resources.

Is it only politics that is aecting the Manipuri landscape and

the North-East as a whole? Not necessarily, as this aspect is also

closely related to a regretul history, a complex geography and an

inefcient economics, so as to say, that is spoiling every generation.

In our homeland, we have so many beautiul places to die or, and

vast natural resources to kill or. However we are caught in a time

warp, unable to break ree rom the chains that tie us to our tribal

instincts. We have been exploited... we have been humiliated... wehave been cheated... but this is not just done. A gun is not at all

enough to bring us salvation we need thought and discipline and

reason and commitment and planning and what not.

We rise to every dissension and sink to any depth o social-

economical and political tragedy. We are resilient to this experience

would mean but to be preoccupied with a deeatists

psychology.

Getting to the basics, the Manipur State Development

Report in 2006 surveyed we have a meagre 6.73% o the

gross geographical area o the state, which is classifed

as agricultural land. An inefcient centralised planning,

with an acute inrastructural scarcity and lack o resource

mobilisation, has been cited as the oundation o the

present economic doldrums. No wonder, the successive

governments are resorting to overdrats to pay the

employees in various departments.

Throw garbage politics into the dust-bin. Because

there are also smart and intelligent people in our lot.

But do we need to gloriy this group o wise men? We

are overawed by them and we wish we could be like

them. There is no prize or guessing their identity; we

are talking about our greedy ellow-beings, who deals in

raud, bribery and sleaze. A couple o years ago, in an

opinion poll conducted by the All India Radio, nearly 90%

o the 750 respondents answered corruption is a bigger

issue than HIV/AIDS though the state has the highest

number o the HIV-inected people in India in terms o

population ratio.

Corruption is unbridled where there are low public-

sector salaries, delayed salary payments, weak

perormance evaluation and disciplinary procedures,

extra-budgetary unding mechanisms, and lack o

complaint mechanisms leading to disciplinary action.

It does not take a rocket scientist to identiy the

complication. While culpability might be a debatable

issue, what causes corruption to spread its tentacles

in society is not. It can be minimized only i political

leaders are willing to impartially implement eective

anti-corruption strategies and augment the probability o

detecting and punishing corrupt individuals.

But then this crookedness has eaten up the entrails o

our society. It would be wrong to blame the system as it

concerns each one o us.

We are caught in a web o decadence and,

unortunately, everything is inter-related in the

establishment we cannot expect any positive upshot

out o this mess. Do you see any probability o solving

the problem o drug menace in the state at this juncture?

Is there slight chance o resolving the crises bogging

down the region in the near uture? Not at all and the

answer is simple as that.

The diagnoses do not mean to doctrinaire the multi-

aceted disorder, like once the mainland politicians and

policy makers had done or the sake o expanding the

region. These are rather the quest or a development

paradigm that is conditional on improving the peoples

subjective well-being in an environment o peace. An

air o pessimism is lingering, and is making us more

rustrated. No redemption song can ree our mind. This

pen is all that I have and I doubt, it can write urther.

The dream o a peaceul and just society has remainedas elusive as ever. We are a violent society, trying to

seek recourse to violence to address the issues. Still, we

believe a day will come when man will be equal to man

and blood is shed no more. We want to leave behind a

vision that would survive the turmoil. And nothing else.kupelderanged@gm

ail.com

August32009