Neither here nor there
Manipur's predicament

Amar Yumnam *

Two recent developments are of interest and relevance to the people of Manipur. Of these one is an external and another internal development. The unfolding of the external factor has something to do with the behaviour of the state, and the internal factor involves both state and non-state agents. In both the cases the position of Manipur in a quandary is well established.

External Development:

The external development is something common for the entire North Eastern Region of India, and ipso facto relevant for Manipur. There is now news of Chinese incursions into the present territory of India. What might be the motivating factor behind this move, the Chinese knows best. What we can do is only hazarding guesses given our lived experience in this part of the country.

While doing so we have but to look at the Indian policy perspective for the region as the framework of analysis. The biggest drawback of Indian policies evolved and implemented in this part of the country is the absolute failure to appreciate the South East Asianness of the region. All along India has viewed this reality with suspicion and as security threat.

While policies have been evolved and implemented from this perspective, the people of the region have been taken for granted. India, after more than sixty years of Independence, have failed to appreciate the South East Asianness of the region and view it as enhancement of the great Indian mosaic.

The Chinese must be well aware of this scenario. If we superimpose this realization on the as of today the indefatigable strength of the Chinese economy, and particularly so vis-à-vis India, we should find it rather easy to digest the emerging Chinese behaviour. We know for sure that a booming national economy naturally arouses new international ambitions.

In this the Chinese must be finding the North East as the weak spot where it can bleed her neighbour on slightest poking. While the Chinese have developed infrastructure right upto the Indian borders, India has hesitated to develop even roads in and around the borders on suspicion based on the South East Asianness of the region. The lingering of the unrelenting Indian perspective is well reflected in the recent speeches of the Prime Minister and the Home Minister of India in widely reported high-blown conferences.

The hints for policy intervention smack of addressing the security of India while leaving the core interest of the South East Asian population in India unaddressed.

Internal Development:

Another but internal characteristic increasingly getting manifested in Manipur is the tendency to sacrifice academic interests at the altar of every other interest. While the whole world is preparing hard for competition in an increasingly knowledge economy and society, we are a population collectively unmindful of what are the requirements of this.

It cannot be without some reason that we have now reached this impasse. While the original blame must necessarily be put at the doors of the governance behaviour of the state, of late the non-state agents are as well not free from the blames.

Over the years, the state has cared a hoot about the input requirements for academic advancements. The state perspective has been particularly salient in two areas. During the last three decades, education has been predominantly a state sector business. In this appointments right from the lowest to the college level teachers have been mainly an affair of the two sides of Babupara.

In other words, the qualities and qualifications of the would be teachers have been sacrificed while rent seeking has been the framework of appointment. This compromise on the requisites of the teachers has been accompanied by another larger failure.

Educational qualification has for long been not a primary consideration in all the appointments of the government. These factors have naturally been accompanied by a reality of increasing unemployment of educated youths. All these forces have led to the public viewing education not very essential for employment and livelihood.

During the same period, the terrible decline in the quality of the institutes has had the corollary of the institutes not able to evolve with the times. This has only shaped and reinforced the public view of education and educational institutes in the land. In these circumstances, it should not be surprising that the uninspiring view of education should now be widely held even outside the limits of the state.

In fact, there has emerged during the last three decades or so a large group of population, those nurtured by the state as well as those outside the state but greatly influenced by state perspective of education, who view academics as not so paramount.

We now view academics as something rather easy and to be taken care of as when as felt. We now see education as something not requiring constant attention, but which can be easily acquired as and when desired. Is education really so? Well we urgently need a collective answer to this question.

In the end, I would like to recall an Irish phrase, cead mile failte, meaning a hundred thousand welcomes. We would rather be wishing for welcoming in the Irish way a change where the Government of India would appreciate the South East Asianness of the region, and within the region we all start valuing academics in the life of a society.