Heirok and the Future History of Manipur

Amar Yumnam *

Henceforth Manipur would never be the same. The State is now having an intervention which would have trend-altering effects on the future trajectory of socio-politico-economic life of the people. For once we now have an issue on which we necessarily have to take sides.

That the intervention relates only to the security related aspects of state is a different question. We certainly expect and do need an intervention relating to the larger aspects of development of the land and covering a larger proportion of the territory. There is certainly a need for the governance aspects of state to evolve a strategy to thrive on the merging scenario.

Already Seen: The Heirok intervention has already started having its impact on the polity of the State. This micro intervention has already divided the polity at the macro level in so far as the debate about the pros and cons is concerned.

Besides this division of opinion at the macro level, there is another more prominent divergence of views. While the Heirok population are in favour of this intervention, it is the non-Heirok populace who are expressing reservations on this. This divergence of opinion between the population of the locational context and that of the non-locational has lots of implications.

Why the Divergence: The divergence of opinion more or less between the Heirok and the non-Heirok has roots in the contemporary political economy of the State. First, the State has displayed, particularly during the last two decades, a collapse of both governance and growth.

The locals, the villages, in the State have been left over the years to fend for themselves whether it comes to governance or to development. This has been so in the context of economy-wide collapse of both growth and governance.

Secondly, until very recently, the real and cruel force to be fought by the people was thought to be the excesses committed by the state security forces in the name of countering insurgency. But this had undergone with both the "organizations" losing the avowed characters, and their diktats and actions crossing the boundaries of tolerance.

Thirdly, in the circumstances characterized by the these two features, there has necessarily been an increasing localization of both thought and actions among the people of the State in recent years- a feature reminiscent of the cholera epidemic in the early part of the twentieth century.

It was in this background that the people of Heirok suffered an unfortunate loss of lives. They were left with no alternative but to look for ways in which they could fend for themselves. This is how the demand for weapons for self-defence arose. This demand has come at a time when the mass protests, sit-in dharnas, and suspension of work, etc., were being held in protest against the excesses and demands of the "organizations" at the macro level.

The state naturally jumped into this opportunity to arm the villagers and thereby display a concern for the villagers. It gave the state an opportunity to cover her failures on the governance front.

But ...: But we must still be alive to the fact that arming the villagers can just not be the end in itself; it can only be a beginning. First, we must recall the experience in Zimbabwe where the armed villagers would be with the army whenever the latter are around, and then with the insurgents when the army were absent.

Secondly, in Heirok alone the money being pumped into a compact location would be Rs. 9 lakh per month in the form of salary of the recruits. This certainly would have a drastic impact on the political economy of the village. This would change even the relational dynamics between the families of recruits and the non-recruits in a very visible way.

We must be able to manage the resultant disturbances towards positive developmental outcomes. Secondly, there definitely would emerge a sharp divergence between Heirok where a monthly investment of Rs. 9 lakh is being made and the neighbouring villages where such investments are absent. It is the responsibility of the state to attend to such consequences for post-conflict management is as difficult a task as bringing conflict under control.

For the "Organisations": While the state has definitely taken the steps to capitalize on the circumstances and with a force at that, the Heirok intervention is not without strong implications for the "organizations" as well. They should as well try digesting the lessons emanating from Heirok.

First, the reactions of Heirok are a culmination of the larger feeling being felt throughout the State. The people of the land would not and cannot tolerate nonsense in the name of revolution.

Secondly, the people of the land now demand in clear terms a separation of the genuine revolutionary "organizations" and the "frauds", as argued by a colleague of mine.

While the state has acted on the circumstances, the ball is now in the court of the "organizations". They have to spell out their avowed objectives, character and functional forms once again.

On the part of the state, we would now look forward what it does next on the developmental front as a follow-up to the Heirok. It is now a war of knowledge.