Defiling the understanding of ILP : Penalise the guilty !
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: December 04, 2024 -

This is disturbing and scary too.

And it Should be understood beyond the detection of people who obtained the ILP passes fraudulently for here is a case of some shady Government officials being involved in issuing the passes by flouting set procedures.

So far three officials have been placed under suspension, according to Chief Minister N Biren Singh and while 29 ILP defaulters have been identified and pulled up to be sent back to the places from where they have come, the possibility of others who could have received the ILP passes fraudulently cannot be ruled out.

And this is where the Government would do well to crack the whip and penalise all those responsible for dipping their fingers in the dirty business of issuing such passes by flouting all rules and regulations.

What has made the matter all that more disgusting is the involvement of Government officials, who in all probability are all locals.

Maybe people and these officials need to be reminded how the ILPS was extended to the State of Manipur after years of prolonged protest.

It is important for these officials to go back to 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 before it was extended to the State when the Centre was about to pass the Citizenship Amendment Bill and which has mow become an Act.

It needs to be drilled into the minds of all the officials concerned to go back to the days mentioned above and recall how the Joint Committee on Inner Line Permit System (JCILPS) led from the front to convince the Centre of the need to protect the indigenous people of the land through some mechanism by which the entry of outsiders or non-Manipuris may be regulated.

Remember the days of street protests, when young students who were then in school thought it fit to come out on the streets and face the water cannons used to disperse them.

Remember Sapam Robinhood who was killed during one of the protests to demand the extension of the ILPS to Manipur.

So intense was the demand that even classes remained suspended and students were even dissuaded from going for private tuitions.

These incidents come to mind, and this is where it should not be forgotten that Manipur received ILPS not on a platter, but after a lot of sweat and struggle.

And here is a case of some officials who have not hesitated in issuing the ILP passes fraudulently and this is something not acceptable at all.

The Chief Minister stopped short of naming the SDC who has been placed under suspension in connection with the latest case and this itself should underline how sensitive the matter is to the people.

This fact should not blow over the minds of these Government officials.

The rot within, this is what one can see in the very act of issuing the ILP passes fraudulently, which should not be acceptable to anyone.

How seriously has the people taken the information that at least 29 ILP defaulters have been detected and pulled up ?

Or will this just be another subject for some light discussion at the leikai tea shop in the morning, only to be forgotten once evening sets in ?

Time to take such things seriously for what one is talking about is Manipur and even as the talk doing the round concerns illegal infiltrators from across the border, here is a case of some people found with ILP passes which have been issued fraudulently.

Making things more serious is the doubt cast by the Government that the 29 people could be from Bangladesh, though their addresses show that they are from Assam.

This should ring a bell on how illegal infiltrators have arrived down the decades that today they pose a serious threat to the indigenes of the land and this is where it becomes important for the people to distinguish between indigenes and legal citizens.

At the same time it is also important for the people to acknowledge the fact that Manipur has immense pull factor and as long as vacuums are created in the labour sector, others will rush in to fill the vacuum.

This is what has been happening for decades here and this is something which The Sangai Express has been pointing out from the period when the demand for ILP was at its peak.

The ILP has been extended but the validity of the question why the local people should continue to create the vacuum in the labour sector will continue to be valid, very valid.

Manipur will need more than a regulation or a pass or a piece of paper to address the question of plugging the inflow of non-locals.