No latrine, no power, no water :: Sub-human existence
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: April 12, 2012 -

Statistics do not lie and while mere figures may not exactly tell a story with the depth and insight it requires, there is however something significant in the finding that out of the 6,09,964 Census households surveyed last year, 17.2 pc of the households were found not to have any of the specified assets.

This in effect means that about 1.1 lakh households in the State still do not have access to the basic amenities of life such as a proper latrine, accessibility to water supply, electric supply, kitchen of their own, etc etc.

At a conservative estimate, the number of people living in a household may be put at 4 and this works out to about four lakh people in a State with about 25 lakh people still defecating in the open or having to bathe in the open or having to walk for more than a kilometre to fetch a pail of water.

This figure may be indicative rather than absolute but it brings to light the story of the poor and the deprived section of the people who continue to lead a life that harks back to the Old Stone Age in the face of numerous welfare schemes taken up by the Centre in the last ten years or so.

In many ways this means that the numerous poverty alleviation schemes taken up by the Centre have not reached the intended targets in the State at all and the funds for such programmes may have gone on to line the pockets of the Babudom and the political class.

Corruption speaks out loud and clear in the figure of 17.2 pc of the households surveyed not having access to the barest needs to lead a life with some dignity.

The Indira Awaz Yojna is one such scheme that comes to mind. One of the flagship programmes of the Union Ministry of Rural Development, the scheme aims to provide housing material, such as CI sheets to the rural poor who are clubbed in the Below Poverty Line category.

It is anyone's guess how effectively this scheme has been implemented in Manipur, but the figure noted in the survey of a little over 6 lakh households last year tells a damning story.

The decadal exercise of head count otherwise known as the Census, has moved on from merely recording the population growth or strength of the country but has come to encapsulate the lifestyle or the standard of living of the people and if the findings of the 2011 Census exercise is any indication then it says that quite a large number of people in Manipur still have to live without access to the barest minimum.

The word or the understanding of the term ‘corruption’ speaks out loud and clear in the sub-human conditions in which quite a sizeable number of people have to live and this situation cannot and should not be seen in isolation of the type of governance that has been dished out down the decades by successive Governments.

The increasing reliance on the radio, with 54.4 percent population using it, also tells many a story. While this says something significant about the reach of the All India Radio in the State, it also tells the story of a people who do not have the means to buy or own a TV set nor the required energy, read power supply, to run them.

The 150 percent increase in the use of TV and radio/transistor does not tell the whole story. The other stories that have emerged from the Census exercise continue to tell the story of a State or a people who still have to bend that little more to get access to the bare minimum to lead a dignified life.

Nearly 85 pc of the households covered in the survey do not have any source of water in their premises with close to 38 pc having to trudge more than 500 metres to get their daily water need.

The findings of the survey do not put the State Government in any good light, but then on the other hand this would not come as a shocker if one takes into consideration the fact that majority of the people living in the capital city have to survive with only 3 hours of power supply in a day of 24 hours or water that is supplied twice a week, for only a few hours.

And here we are talking about the people who have been clubbed in the category of those having access to electricity and water supply.