TODAY -
Manipur: Faith blocked
IBN Live | Sumon K Chakrabati | November 16, 2011
India doesn't deserve Manipur. Manipur more than deserves India - despite the holier than thou incarnates in New Delhi. The state faces the worst step-motherly treatment in the history of independent India. And it defies common logic why the state of Manipur would be subjected to such treatment. Because in the 'them versus 'us' debate, the dominant population in the state would qualify as more mainstream than the overwhelming Hindu population in the so called mainland.
Yes, the Meiteis, Vaishnavite Hindus, are the staunchest that you would ever come across in the country, even more than our knickerwallahs in RSS. I say this at the risk of crossing my rabid right-wing followers on twitter. Yet, the Meiteis are not only debarred from special constitutional privileges granted to the Scheduled Tribes of Manipur, they cannot even settle in the hill districts of their own state under Manipur's "Land Reform Act".
But what is more implausible is how a more than 100-day-old blockade is allowed to continue in the state. A state where petrol prices have reached Rs 250 per litre, a cooking gas cylinder is being sold at Rs 2000. A state whose government spokesperson, N Biren, whom I can claim to be a friend of some degree, has the temerity to call and attempt to clarify that top-boxer Mary Kom has not applied for a gas connection, therefore she has to buy the gas cylinder at black market rates. In a state, where the all-empowered Army is protected by the draconian Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA).
The great Indian highway robbery has to stop.
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* This Post is uploaded on November 16 2011
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