Scheduled Tribe demand regressive, says UNLF-I
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, November 23 2013 :
The United National Liberation Front (UNLF) Central Committee has categorically stated that the new born demand for re-classification of Meiteis as Scheduled Tribe reflects a re-gressive state of mind as well as a withdrawal syndrome.
Greeting all the people of Manipur on the occasion of the 49th raising day of UNLF, the Central Committee, through a press statement, invited members of all ethnic groups in Western South East Asia (WESEA) to participate actively in the liberation struggle against India and its reactionary puppets.
The sudden spurt of agitation in February 2013, by certain groups of Meiteis for reclassifying their community as scheduled tribes at the behest of elements in the Indian bureaucracy are events that would have brought smug smiles on the faces of the co-lonial masters.
That shows that the colonial masters' fond dream of raising a generation of Meiteis plagued by self-doubt and inured in the habit of dependency has begun to materialize.
This clique of Meiteis has obviously forgotten their history.
It is a sign that these cli-ques are at odds with the world's forward civilisational march.
Their demand bespeak a singular absence of pride in their community and its history as also a lack of vitality.
In the contemporary scenario of the world pushing forward towards new horizons of progress, going back- wards (towards tribe) will be counter-productive.
"The self-prescription for jettisoning the contemporary Meitei profile which represents a fusion of seven salais (clans) over a historical period for and opt for the status of a tribe reflects a regressive state of mind as well as a withdrawal symptom", the central committee asserted.
The prescription will have no adherents amongst self-respecting and thinking peo- ple.
A likely long-term outcome of this prescription will be to backstab each other in the mad rush to grab dwind-ling opportunities and thus pave the way for the self-annihilation of the society and polity.
"The prescription cannot equip us to participate me- aningfully in the universal race towards progress and development; at best, it can only deepen and reinforce dependency on the colonial masters", it remarked.
On the other hand, the po-tential for fomenting mistrust among the communities in the hills and the valley and further fragmenting the already troubled composite life is im-mense.
The likely competition for jobs and other opportunities reserved for the STs by the Indian Constitution is on-ly likely to set up the people in both the hills and the valley against each other as never before.
In such an event, it will be an unforgivable crime against history.
For the colonial masters, it will be sweet triumph, it cautioned.
Commenting on the prevailing situation, the outfit said that ups and downs are a natural part of the process of change.
"UNLF firmly holds that temporary setbacks can and will be overcome when the liberation groups realize their mistakes and correct co-urse and unveil the true face of the struggle" .
The growing apathetic trend among the people towards their rights as a human being and their lackadaisical awareness of the need to stru-ggle to wrest these rights is equally dangerous as the gro-wing dependency on the colo- nial masters and their puppets to respect and uphold their fundamental human rights.
These circumstances have emboldened the colonial masters and their agents to cast the struggle for freedom and change in an unfavourable light and thereby snap the organic link with the people.
Recent incidents of expelling individuals from their villages who have contributed their mite to the struggle for liberation and change by falsely accusing them of child-lifting and torching their houses at the instigation of hidden agent provocateurs of the colonial masters as also the serial bomb blasts triggered which claimed innocent lives are examples of the persistent attempts to sully the image of struggle for liberation and change.
"There is only one objective behind such engineered episodes and that is, to delegitimize our national freedom struggle and those who are waging it", it asserted.
The Manipur-India conflict has engendered countless incidents of gruesome torture and killings and people have expressed their desire for putting an end to such gruesome incidents in a number of ways.
It is the objective of the colonial system to sap the inner moral strength and convictions of their subjects born out of their inalienable rights as members of the human race by repressing or terrorizing them.
"The consciousness of being a human being equal to anyone else inlaid with a sense of strong self-respect is what the colonial masters fear most in their subjects.
For, these are the true marks of liberation.
The gun is the visible symbol of defiance of the oppressor enemy as also enabler of this inner journey that all our compatriots who love and prize freedom � be they scholars or be they physically challenged � must undertake", it said.
"We believe that degeneration in our social values have been caused by India's colonial system which has wilfully sacrificed imperatives of economic growth for Manipur thereby diminishing the space for productive economic activity of the people", read the statement.
This combined with the race for cornering the benefits of development by any means, fair or foul, has incentivized a growing number of people into selling their self-respect.
Squeezing the space for common people's livelihood is a deliberate means used by the colonial system to deepen the people's dependency on India.
Strategically, the development policy of the colonial master is designed to create a new class of rich and powerful turncoats to implement its agenda for turning Manipur into a 'slave state' of India, it said.
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