Ukhrul : Living with infamy - Date with deaths
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: September 20, 2014 -

The sense of outrage is understandable. So is the grief of loss made all that more heart rending by the knowledge that yet two more lives have been snuffed out senselessly.

Murder is the word that comes to mind.

And it was that two women were killed in a bomb blast at a hardware store in Viewland at the heart of Ukhrul district headquarters on September 17 evening.

While no one seems to know who were behind the dastardly act of triggering a bomb blast inside a hardware store it is more than clear that it could not have been the handiwork of any desperado but points to the existence of a well established network of criminals masquerading as people who have taken up a cause for the sake of all.

Did the two women die because they happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time or was it due to a well thought out agenda by a group of people who had the ability to carry out such a clinical operation ?

Tough to say, but the initial findings, which have been reported in the local newspapers, should be enough indications that the two women were killed because they happened to pass near a shop which had been served monetary demands from the power players, who are obviously non-State actors.

Seven killed in the last couple of months may just be statistics to many, but to the people who have lost their near and dear ones, it would mean much more than mere statistics.

The family members and friends of the two women who died in the bomb blast will vouch for this and so will all the others whose near and dear ones have fallen prey to the machinations of some demented minds.

The number of deaths in the last couple of months should be enough indications that Ukhrul is today home to a number of anti-social elements, who will not hesitate to kill as long as it serves their purpose.

The biggest tragedy however does not lie with the anti-social elements but in the manner in which people have allowed themselves to be shepherded into a line of thinking and this is true for the whole State of Manipur and not Ukhrul alone.

This is where the people need to come together, pool their heads and see how they can counter such a culture.

The time for silence is over. Now is the time for the people as a whole to raise their collective voice and make a clear stand.

Ukhrul has been in the news for all the wrong reasons and it should be more than clear that the time has indeed come for all conscientious people to speak out coherently against the elements who have gained a certain degree of social legitimacy because of the meekness of the people.

Time to tell such elements to pack up and leave.

Killers do not exist in a vacuum but thrive in society where the mind has been preconditioned and primed by a well thought out agenda, which may include naked threats and ‘gentle but firm’ persuasion.

Difficult to say when such a trend started but Ukhrul today represents a place where the conditions are just right for such elements to come to positions of influence and sweep the people’s minds and blind them with some high sounding rhetorics that may appeal to the ears but benumb the mental senses.

For all its failures and shortcomings, it was encouraging to see the State Government responding to the latest killings so swiftly.

Chief Minister O Ibobi may still have to go miles before he wins any friends in Ukhrul district, but it was nevertheless significant to see the State Government responding so swiftly to the latest killings in Ukhrul.

True no one has as yet been nailed and there is nothing to suggest that the State Government has come anywhere near nailing the culprits for the dastardly killings, but the Chief Minister did talk tough.

However tough talk need not always translate into anything concrete and the State Government needs to acknowledge that it still has to do much more than just indulge in tough talk.