Media and Contemporary Manipuri Society
- Part 2 -

Rajendra Kshetri *

*** Delivered on RK Sanatomba Memorial Lecture (June 30, 2015)

"A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself
—Arthur Miller.

Corruption and Contemporary Society

Having said this, I must, however, mention (and this is my random thoughts and personal feeling) that mass media here in Manipur have not come up to people's expectation especially when it comes to dealing with the corrupt practices of ruling dispensation. It needs no saying or re-saying, or telling or retelling how corrupt successive governments have been in Manipur.

Stories and fairytale like tales of how schemes after schemes, funds after funds, projects after projects meant for development have been misused/abused, hijacked /diverted, mismanaged/misappropriated by the powers that be, are plenty and legion. Whether it was/is bureaucrats, technocrats or politicians (barring very few), they all speak/act/indulge in one single voice and unilateral direction: "grab what you can and let others go to heir. A graffiti that I have seen in the capital city of Imphal in the early eighties sums up the whole scenario: "Lakhs at Gunpoint, crores at Pen point".

Distinguished luminaries, media persons and friends, I am not here to speak on corruption though it is what transformed Manipur into a "failed state". It is corruption that gives Manipur a degree of "zero governance". It is corruption that enables Manipur to run on a "sponsored economy". All that I am trying to say is that this is one issue, serious issue that the media could and should take up and try to expose corruption at high levels.

If media persons could do it elsewhere, I see no apparent reason why our media persons cannot do it here. Let me mention here, in the passing, two defining moments of investigative journalism in the history of mass media. The first is the "Watergate Scandal". The "Watergate Scandal", as we all know, was the biggest political scandal in the history of the United States that occurred in the 1970s. When it began in 1972 as a burglary of the offices of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Hotel, not much attention was paid. It was not any political party (read Democrat) nor was it any civil society or civil rights group but two Reporters of "Washington Post" - Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward - who kept on digging until they discovered a hidden world of political espionage and sabotage masterminded by the Nixon Presidency.

The Pulitzer prize winning investigative account of the two reporters led to the impeachment of Richard Nixon who resigned the Presidency on 9 August, 1974. The second is the story of how Arun Shourie, the US trained economist turned Editor (of Indian Express) had broken the big Autulay story. In 1981, A.R. Autulay was the Maharashtra Chief Minister (of the Congress government) during Indira Gandhi's Prime Ministership. Arun Shourie's exposure of corruption revealed that the Chief Minister Autulay had started an organization called the "Indira Gandhi Pratibha Pratishthan" through which he collected illicit funds from builders.

The exposure appeared in the front page of Indian Express as series of articles under the caption "Indira Gandhi as Commerce". (I was pursuing my Masters in Bombay University at that time and was fortunate enough to be a living witness to the scandal). The corruption scandal forced Autulay to resign. What was remarkable about Shourie's exposure is that there was no such thing as Right to Information Act (RTI) those days.

I may also mention here that "Bofors Pay Off - "Bofors Scandal" during 1980s and 1990s was exposed by the continued and concerted efforts of media - particularly The Indian Express and The Hindu - which was responsible for the defeat of Rajiv Gandhi's ruling Indian National Congress Party in 1989 general elections and catapulted V.P. Singh into political limelight.

Ladies and gentlemen, I am aware of the fact that the working conditions and degree of professionalism of media persons/journalists in the US, India and Manipur are quite different. Nor am I unaware that media persons in Manipur work under trying circumstances and differently difficult situations. (What with AFSPA - the most notorious, barbaric and inhuman Act on earth - monitoring every movement, every second, of the people).

My only plea and submission here is that such risk factors are associated elements and part and parcel of what can be termed as the most demanding and challenging profession in the world - journalism/mass media.

Three Basic Issues/ Problems: As I have stated at the beginning of my lecture, I am not a media person and as such have no qualifications whatsoever to place here any 'dos' and 'don'ts' for mass media vis-a-vis contemporary Manipuri society. Having been a practicing sociologist for the last three decades, I would like to believe that I am as concerned a citizen as any other in the society and deem it my duty to share with my fellow Manipuris.

Please allow me therefore, to place here before you three basic issues/problems confronting the daily life of common man in Manipur. They are too basic and fundamental so much so that they have been taken for granted for too long. The first issue pertains to electricity. We all know the pathetic scenario of power supply in Manipur. We all know that power supply in the state is regularly irregular. We all know that 'load shedding' is the only term which is on the lips of every Manipuri, literate or illiterate.

We also know that Manipur depends almost 99% on Central Sector Generating Stations (CSGS) from which Manipur gets an allocated share of 132 MW against the peak demand of 180 MW. What we do not know is that in reality, the average availability is around 80 MW only. The unaccounted or rather the unutilized power in the tune of 52 MW is lost or diverted somewhere. What we do not care to know is that after taking into account several losses such as Aggregate Technical and Commercial loss, Manipur utilized only 24 MW for billing (read ostensibly) out of CSGS allocated share of 132 MW. (if we are to believe the data provided by the Joint Electricity Regulatory Commission for Manipur and Mizoram and we have no reason to believe otherwise).

Unbelievable but true. Nowhere in the country will we find such a scenario. Where has the rest MW, 108 MW to be precise, gone ? How and why has it beenlost/unutilized/unaccounted? Nobody bothers or seemed to bother, least of all, the consumers.

To be continued...