Respecting the sanctity of Kangla No Entry sign to VIPs
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: March 16, 2013 -
Kangla - The Sacred place for Manipuri :: Pix - Robert Lourembam Ningthouja
Finally the Kangla Board seems to have taken a stand. Kangla not to be used as a thorough fare for vehicles belonging to the class of people called VIPs and security forces.
Good move. But then again, will the personnel on sentry duty be really empowered to stop vehicles of the political leaders and security forces from entering Kangla ? Doubtful.
Anything can be passed on paper. Notifications can be issued. What really matters is the implementation at the ground reality.
Caught in the Sahib Mentality time warp, nothing less. Kangla, of course, has been off limit for the vehicles belonging to the hoi polloi and the notification issued by the Kangla Board should be seen in the context of how people in positions of power and influence have been screaming their status symbol by whizzing through this stretch, as and when it suits them.
The irony becomes palpable when viewed against the fact that before 2004, no civil Government officials or politicians or State security officers would have thought it possible to pass through this stretch with their convoys, when it was occupied by the Assam Rifles !
In issuing the notification, the joke is clearly on the State Government or on those people who come under the tag, VIP. The need to keep the record straight is in line.
It was not the persuasion of the State Government nor the lobbying by the people in the corridors of power which ultimately led the Centre to hand over Kangla to the State Government in 2004.
Kangla was won over the battered and brutalised body of Th Manorama in 2004, it was won by the marathon agitation launched to demand the repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, following the killing of Th Manorama, and it was won after the nude protest staged by womenfolk near its southern gate.
The rest, as they say, is history. Shortly after Kangla was handed over to the State Government, The Sangai Express had documented and published the stories of how the construction material, such as tin roofing material were smuggled out from inside Kangla !
In a way it is this mindset, the refusal to respect a place, without which the story of Manipur can never be complete, that one finds in the manner in which people coming under the category of VIPs continue to disturb the ambience inside Kangla by using it as a thorough fare !
The mindset has to change. It goes beyond the question of VIPs trundling into Kangla with their motorcades, but has something significant to do with how people in positions of power and influence view the heritage of the people.
Respect for the place, respect for the movement that eventually led to the Centre to hand over Kangla to the people, respect for the woman over whose battered and brutalised body Kangla was handed over to the State Government and the people.
Obviously these fundamental truths have blown over the heads of the people who matter, or else why would the Kangla Board feel it necessary to come out with a notification that no one, barring the Governor and the Chief Minister, would be allowed to enter Kangla in their vehicles ?
Seeing the unfortunate part in a positive course of action taken up, one may say.
To think that a place which is central to the history of Manipur stands exposed to the vagaries of the mighty and powerful is a damning statement on how the affairs of the State have been managed and run for long.
The Kangla Board has done its job in coming out with the notification and now it is left to be seen whether all the people will fall in line and acknowledge that there is indeed the need to respect the sanctity of Kangla.
No matter how high one may come in the pecking order, no one has the right to defile the sanctity and ambience of a place which is historically central to Manipur.
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