Recent Character of Manipur's Provincial Security Forces: Observations of an insect

Amar Yumnam *

Any society necessarily involves co-existence of many forms of life from the non-moving trees and plants to the moving insects, human beings, animals and others. In Manipur, the human beings are the Police, IRB and MR personnel and the Very Important Persons protected by them, while the rest human looking beings are insects.

I belong to the latter group. Being free as an insect I am very mobile and move about in Manipur, particularly Imphal and the adjoining areas, fairly frequently. With the kindness of God, I have seen with own eyes the character, functioning and quality of interaction of the comparable human beings in North America, Europe, South East Asia, and East Asia besides India.

Of late, I feel the life of an insect like me is most precarious in the case of Manipur than anywhere else excepting Boko Haram and IS areas. Whereas in the rest of the world, the insects feel encouraged to feel secured and enjoy life cool by the character, functioning and quality of interaction of the human beings as defined here, the opposite seems to be the case in Manipur.

The last few years seemed to have given signs of progression in the sense particularly of the Police, IRB and MR personnel displaying greater transparency and accountability in character and enhanced absence of violence in social display of functioning, but right now it is salient that all these have been replaced by an absolute absence of any respect and care for the insects, haughtiness in public display of behaviour, ready application of languages faulty rather than normal on anybody not adopting slavish reaction to their haughty behaviour, parading of violent and uncultured looks on insects and heightened manifestation of all these qualities and capabilities in places where there is crowding of insects; there is no other place to prove their superiority as human beings except in places crowded by plenty of insects.

While this is, fortunately for the insects, not a generalised feature yet among the human beings belonging to this category, ther! e are sure signs that their population is on the rise of late. Since Police, IRB and MR are under a single organisation, this insect understands that the organisation has a head. I would like to appeal to this head to instil character, discipline, and educate to display appropriate public behaviour among the human beings under him to inspire confidence, trust, inclination for ready cooperation and feeling for emulation by the insects.

Now the human being may ask me why he should bother about what happens to and with the insects. I would like to respond to this that police is an important institution in any nation with responsibilities for ensuring a peaceful, violence-free conduct of life and shared enhancement of well-being of the insects. This institution is not important in itself, but its importance is derived from serving these interests; it is a most pivotal institution of the entity called the state.

Till a decade back there were many vehicles of these human beings bearing no registration numbers. However this was altered and till very recently it was rare to come across such vehicles on the streets of Imphal and around. This however is no longer the case, and the frequency of encountering such vehicles with blank or removed registration plates is getting mildly exponential. As an insect aware inter alia of the accountability and responsibility dimensions of registration numbers of vehicles, this multiplier of non-numbered vehicles of a dreadfully empowered human beings has adversarial implications for the insects.

As of now Manipur has a rich history of unaccounted disappearance of insects. In this context and given the global experience of such phenomenon, this multiplier of non-numbered vehicles could mean either that these human beings have already performed successful missions among the insects or are on a mission for some more among the insects. Now what are these missions?

Whatever the case, these missions would amount to elimination of some insects without getting verified, or indulgence in activities violating the honoured norms of relationship with the insects, or violating the very norms of functioning prevalent among themselves. At the extreme level, there could be cases of collusion between the able government functionaries and these human beings for indulging in all possible crimes to garner personalised benefits. This suspicion and accompanying fear is reinforced by the revealed non-mannerisms and dirty vocabulary of these human beings.

Now the term government immediately reminds me of the challenges facing governments around the globe. As an insect taking interest in governance issues, I am aware that governments around the globe are now hard-pressed for performance in a highly altered and vastly dynamic contexts. Now this context is getting increasingly globalised so much so that the world is now working hard to evolve global rules of law in place of the country rules of law.

These changed circumstances have put pressure on the capability of the traditional governments to govern effectively as the conventional approach of command and control no longer suffices; governments are increasingly asking for aid from all sections for establishing an influential governance. Manipur too is now placed in a very critical juncture where the sub-national government is ill-prepared for any change happening within and around.

First, in the post-merger period, Manipur government has not evolved any sustainable tradition of governance which inspires confidence, trust and ready cooperation of the insects.

Second, it has not endeavoured to nurture a kind of identity and strength of the collective of the insects. Instead it has only sharpened the adversity among the insects; diversity has been converted into conflict instead of harnessing the collective strength. The temporary craze of the human beings in the government has replaced any historically rooted collective strength of the insects and stunted the emergence of any shared commitment for a better future among the insects.

The increasingly unfolding revealed behaviour of the Police, IRB and MR is testimony of this contemporary behaviour of human beings in Manipur getting wider and deeper with limitations inherent in governance system collapsing and rather acquiring a new strength to even eliminate any insect causing any kind of limitation on their free-ride; the expediency of the human beings as defined here is the only thing that matters today.

This rise of a new violent, irresponsible and haughty behaviour among the Police, IRB and MR of Manipur is happening at a time when the sub-national government needs to prepare herself with new strengths, capabilities and approaches to face the unfolding globalisation processes by establishing an influential governance system.

This requires for the government to call for assistance from all sets of life. The Police, IRB and MR should also be the mobilising agency for harnessing support for the government from all sides as well as the agency for controlling nonsense within the government and among the insects; collusion with any crime prone individuals and parties would have long term damages for Manipur.

The head of this institution is expected to immediately initiate steps to discipline the cocky human beings under him if the interests of Manipur are to be served; he has irons in the fire. This is an insect’s wish for the future of Manipur and the well-being of all forms of life.