Vigilantism raises its ugly head
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: April 03, 2011 -
A MEMBER OF the Pallel Zilla Parishad, Md Sahauddin was called out from his house in Sora on March 31, 2011 by gunmen who shot him dead around 9.30 pm the same night. Locals suspected five persons to be behind the killing of Sahauddin. A married couple was among the five.
The couple, Md Mujibala and Nursana Begum, from Sora Awang Leikai was lynched by a mob on April 1, 2011 around 9 am. This gruesome crime has brought forward the stark reality of how violence has permeated into our culture. But why does mob justice find a place in our society?
Obviously, the inability of our law enforcing agencies to marshal social order is a big factor. Unfortunately, this is not the whole story. The conflict situation which besieges our society has given rise to the concept of street justice.
The law enforcing agencies are busy tackling UG movements and acts and mindless violence has slipped into the shoes of civil policing. The result is mayhem. To cut short, Manipur has become a lawless land.
Both Md Mujibula and his wife Nursana Begum could have been 100% perpetrators of the homicide of ZP Member Md Sahauddin, but they were denied any opportunity to explain the level of their guilt or the motives which led to their involvement in the crime.
Whether their actions could have been construed as part of a man slaughter nobody will be able to know for sure. Instant 'justice' delivered by people least trained for and least aware of the concept of justice has rendered the notion redundant.
Let us remind ourselves that even the criminals created by the Nazi regime were given ample opportunity to defend themselves, not so in Manipur. Perhaps people here find it tedious to go to a law court and simply prefer to reason that if somebody murders some one we should promptly murder the murderer.
But what if Mujibula and Nursana had been relatives of the vigilantes who took their lives? Or worse, what would be the stand of the vigilantes if their kith and kin find themselves in the place of Mujibula and Nursana?
And what if relatives of Mujibula and Nursana then demand their pound of flesh? One hopes, then, the lynching mob does not make a bolt for the hills. Such is the lack of after thought that street justice expresses.
Elders in the society please rise to put a check to this anarchical situation. Violence of various types engulfs our society and we cannot afford to remain twiddling our thumbs.
The very warp and woof of our society which our elders have stitched together over the centuries to provide the veneer to our civilization is being vandalized right before our eyes. Surely it will be difficult for us to remain indifferent when others term us as a people who have run amok.
There is more than meets the eye in this culture of violence. This is no longer a law and order problem.
It is a problem of a society where ethical and social values are being spurned and mocked at. We have to accept that our society has become a sick society.
If not for anybody else, at least for our progeny we have to rise together to care for this land, the only place in the world identified with us.
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