Killing just one person a day, totals to 365 a year !!!

Aeroshil Nameirakpam *

Listening to ISTV news everyday I have come to a conclusion that atleast on an average 4 people die an immature death every day in Manipur. Recent statistical survey shows that more people die of violence and insurgency related incidents in Manipur then Jammu & Kashmir.

Whole world knows about the condition in Kashmir I wonder who knows or every care to bother about Manipur and its issues, forget on global scale even in the Indian Subcontinent.

I have never understood what are we fighting for and why do we have such unrest in manipur ? Why there is so much mistrust, hatred and feeling of dislike not only with govt and its the people but among individuals as well.

First thing our parents told us when we left Manipur was "Don't be friends with meitei machas". I alway grew up listening to things like we have amazing culture and the whole world knows how much culturally rich we are. When our parents raised us we were given all virtues and values on which we stand tall right now and I am pretty sure all of us Meitei machas were brought up in similar environment.

Then what went wrong on the way. Where did we loose those values and principles. I simply fail to understand why God fearing, morally rich and simple but talented meitei machas changed so much over a short period of time.

The kind of incidents that we come across in the news makes me think like..can a human being do such heinous things. Wife hacked by an axe and husband killed by locals in front of his kids which included a 20 days old baby !! teenage boy killed for property dispute ,girls forced to suicide due to mental and physical trauma.

Sounds like only demons and barbarians could do such things. Seems like our lovely motherland has been very cruelly cursed by some dark forces and that will only stop only when everything is eliminated. How did we reach to a situation like this I simply dont understand.

But I do have a theory and possible cause of what is happening in Manipur. There is a saying the one thing that is just required for Devils to prosper is for the Angels to do nothing. I feel it all started in the 1980's when an entire population of youth was wiped out by drug addiction and later by AIDS.

People who lived and died in that era were supposed to be holding good position and leading the society by now. The impact we are feeling right now is just an aftermath of that mass missing of entire generation. This missing of entire generation took with them some very good and talented people along and was devastating to the livelihood of many families who lost someone.

The economic loss was devastating too. Manipur was just behind Assam in mid 80's in terms of development and skilled man power but now we are lagging behind most of north eastern states. In order to feel these gaps, only people left were either uneducated and uncultured people who had very little convincing power and never interacted with outside world.

Using tactics of intimation , drug money and bribing the entire voters these people came into power. Once they are in power their entire focus and effort were directed at getting personal gains and recover money spend on election coz spending Rs. 500 per voter is some money.

Corruption naturally took its roots and once that started there was no place of truthfulness, justice and fairness in society and the rest is history and i dont need to elaborate. Every agitation, dharna, bands, strike, curfew just expressed that those in power are not responsibly performing their duties.

In the first place they dont have enough qualification to hold the positions they are holding and secondly their focus is on something else. Communication gap is also a very big issue between the govt and our people and with the central government. Our so called leaders cant even speak Hindi or English properly, how can they convince an ex Advisor to the IMF ManMohan Singh ,Prime Minister of India.

Recently Home minister Chidambaram said the AFSPA will be amended to a more humane act. Thats it !!! Sharmila starved for 10 years, people died in huge numbers agitating against it and it was just nothing but just change of some few sentences or words in the AFSPA document.

Did anyone read the AFSPA Act properly ? If it was just few words and sentences that needed to be changed it could have been done in a democratic way by one of our representative without people getting killed and Sharmila still starving.

I simply dont understand what is going on. The only possible solution to all our problems and worries has to start from the root and the root of all our grievances was that Rs. 500 we took from unqualified and uneducated politicians during election and casted our vote along with selling off our dreams, future of the young generation ...everything just for that Rs. 500!!!

Let us have Highly educated morally strong people come into power, let us nominate these people to important post and position so that they make wise and just decision for the people.

We dont need 100 good people to bring out change. We just need one noble soul to change the world someone like Barak Obama. Then we will see things in Manipur improve. Let us give a chance to the Angels before it is too late.