Reflecting on Bandhs & Blockades
- Part 1 -

E Bijoykumar Singh *

24 hours General Strike called against incursion by Nagaland at Dzuko Valley on May 23 2015 :: Pix - Shankar Khangembam

Irrationality of traditional farmers has been one of the oldest debates in economics. They are averse to adoption of HYV technology. It has been extended to jhumias who despite knowing the many adverse effects of jhum cultivation in the hills and abysmally low yields cannot be weaned from this practice.

Now mainstream economists are gradually realizing that given the constraints they face their decisions cannot be straightaway dismissed as irrational. In the hills everything except land is scarce. The complementary inputs of better technology are inaccessible widely. It is also a common sight to find many people fishing when people are evacuated in times of flood. It is fishing in troubled water in the real sense.

We have a situation where the people have managed to get the best out of the given situations , not bothering about the possibilities. This can be extended to the behaviour of the public in times of shut downs, popularly known as bandhs& blockades. Bandhs&blockades(b&b) have become a part of our culture and have become part of our vocabulary like any other word. We have been talking about the effects of both in many ways.

There is no disagreement on some adverse effects of b&b. There are strictures from the Supreme court of India. Recently the Meghalaya Highcourt also took a strong stand against it ordering the state government not to remain a passive spectator. In Manipur there was a waning phase in b&b when almost every civil society organisation came out against it. Then we are back to square one.

The only change is the extent and coverage. Gone are the days when Manipur bandh used to be a real statewidebandh when government employees were required to stay overnight in their offices to keep the offices open. Today b&b have become largely localised based on the issues. Statewide shut down for local issues evokes local shut downs only.

Statewide shut downs become total when prominent civil society organisations also support them. Shutdowns are popular in the valley and blockades in the hills. Recently valley based bodies also have resorted to blocking the national highways.The structure of shutdowns is also changing. Earlier not a single vehicle would plyon such days. Today the mornings of such days would see substantial traffic.

The supporters would come out in the roads around 9.30 am and do everything they like till about 4 pm. The police would come , wiser than before after many rounds of police-public relationship workshops, to clear the obstructions, if any. So a 24 hour shutdown is enforced during the office hours only. Sometimes an unexpected shutdown comes as a huge relief to our hectic work schedule particularly when it falls one day before or after a normal holiday.

There were several occasions when I had to walk upto Canchipur for urgent work due to shutdowns. Walking ,thus, is exempt.Shutdowns exempt medical & water supply, education , the press and religious functions. Can education be exempted in the real sense when public transport is off the roads ? In fact the most visible aspect of any shutdown is the disappearance of buses from our roads smaller private vehicles including rickshaws fill up the vacuum to some extent.

But exemptions have complicated the matter. I cannot help recollecting one of our ministers innocently saying after a major incident in our pride ‘ the Sangai festival’ that he thought entertainment was also exempted. Blockades have become economic blockades. It seeks to ban movement of petroleum products, food items, construction materials etc which are meant for sale in the market.

Is it in the sense of ‘economic’ in mainstream economics ?Is it the volume or is it the nature of the content of your bag ? When does your bags&baggages become economic largely depends on your ‘persuasive skills’ using the universal language of the day.

Normally shutdowns should happen after negotiations have failed. In our case most negotiations follow shutdowns. Shutdowns have been used widely to set the stage for dialogue between established or ad hoc civil society organisations and the government.Though the sequence is unnatural we have come to regard it as natural. The extent of hurt can be gauged from the response of public and the government seems to be assessing it before entering into any dialogue.

The public support is taken as a signal of the extent of hurt. In economics we deal it under asymmetric information. The recent incident involving our hon’ble speaker and a police officer is an example. Without the widespread support of civil society organisations in favour of the police officer , the outcome would have been different. What is known of the incident today is the suspension of the commander.

What is intriguing is the recent denial by his wife that his suspension is a farce and a cover up. Rarely the outcomes of the dialogues are reported in the media. Are not these outcomes newsworthy ? ‘The parties have come to an agreement with the hon’ble CM declaring no one will be spared’ is the known outcome of any such negotiation.

Whether government jobs have been given or how the surviving family members are going to be rehabilitated are never reported. It will be interesting research to do a follow up of those events that led to shutdowns and blockades. The death of the breadearner in any family can destabilise a family. We should know how the government and the society have helped in resettling those unfortunate families. We should know whether they have been used as pawns in the game for power. It is also in the government’s interest to have a platform for exchange of information on such rehabilitation packages.

Recently we organised an international seminar on our Look and Act East policy. Participants from Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Myanmar, Cambodia, Maldives and many states in India came to be greeted with a shutdown on Dzuko valley. There was a time when there was no hotel in Manipur capable of handling such eventualities satisfactorily.

We managed to complete our task with some last minute adjustments without hurting any sentiment. Classic Grande, a new hotel in Chingmeirong , came up with a solution for everything. The proprietor of the hotel Dr Dhaballi, the model entrepreneur of Manipur, told me that many more facilities were in the pipeline. In short facilities for handling such eventualities will become an integral part of hotel management just like fire escape routes. What is important in this example is the coping strategy.

B&B ,in my opinion, no longer have the same destabilising impact on any segment of society as they used to. Some people consider them as opportunities for earning some money and those who cannot do anything also have come up with strategies for minimising the adverse effects. If winners compensate the losers, the winners will still be left with some profit.

The government has done little in this case and has chosen to be a passive spectator. It is meant to tire the opponent. The fizzling intensity of b&b over the decades can be largely attributed to this approach. All we see are the heavier-than-usual deployment of police along the mainroads and the coordination where police come to clear the burning tyres and roadblocks .

The damage done to public infrastructure is beneficial to the contractors. The contractors in Manipur have finally come to the centre stage of power game. Majority of our politicians have been contractors before they become full time politicians . It is questionable if they have grown beyond that profession.

To be continued...