Reading Between the Lines: Manipur Assembly Election 2012

Dr. Pahel M. Soibam *

People going to the poll on Election Day in Imphal on January 28 2012 :: Pix by Banti Phurailatpam

If one were to analyze the results of the Manipur Assembly Elections 2012, it should be obvious to the discerning mind that the people who have always remained bound up with fetters of terror and politics have chosen the lesser devil. Various quarters and certainly the vested interest have tried to make the results appear at odds with logic.

However, there were no dearth of sensibility and logic in the way people have chosen to have their silenced voice heard. Look at the voter turn-out over the decades of various elections. It has always been much higher than national averages, always higher than the most "mainstream" states of the Indian Union.

Digest it along with the fact that terror groups in Manipur have always questioned the legitimacy of elections held within the ambit of the Indian Constitution. The common people have being saying something all along. The only problem was that no one ever gave it a damn.

The Indian National Congress at both the state and central levels is not known for clean politics or governance. Before the Assembly Election, Mr. Ibobi was being seen for so long as a self-serving corrupt Chief Minister whose popularity was fast taking a nosedive. He was in fact seen as so far the least popular Chief Minister who has also earned many an enemy for himself among the politicians both inside and outside of the Indian National Congress.

The powerful militant groups had declared a war against the Indian National Congress. Political pundits had written off Mr. Ibobi's and the Indian National Congress' chances in the Election. Although the exit polls had given an inkling of people's mood, most of them were taken by surprise and shock with the results that gave Indian National Congress the absolute majority. Now, what went in favor of Mr. Ibobi and the Indian National Congress?

The militant syndicates did the greatest and detrimental favor to the Indian National Congress by declaring a war on the political party. Mr. Ibobi and the Indian National Congress owe their stupendous success to these militant syndicates. There are questions doing the rounds in many quarters as to whether the Indian National Congress and the militant syndicates were in some form of understanding.

Notwithstanding these questions, one thing is very clear: the people, who have been living every second of their lives at the mercy of the various terror groups and the anti-terror security forces, have given their verdict. For them, Mr. Ibobi and the Indian National Congress are lesser devils as compared to the militant syndicates. Surprising? A far-fetched idea?

The common people are far less dumb than assumed on the basis of their helpless attitude when it comes to the mighty gun wielding militants who have been for so many decades now committing all sorts of crimes on them with impunity. The common people are helpless because they are normal human beings who love and feel the pain and loss of their parents, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters and relatives whom the militant syndicates can and do target at their whims and fancy anywhere anytime.

The state with its unreliable security forces cannot ensure safety anywhere anytime. That is why the common people are left with no other way but keep suffering silently while the state's coffers are being plundered, infrastructures are being destroyed, educational institutions are dysfunctional, governance is paralyzed, economy is in tatters, their daughters are being raped, minor sons are being forced to join militancy, their sons and daughters are being killed for refusing to obey orders, a Jungle Raj is being run with terror as the currency, the economic and living standards of the people are spiraling towards hell, everyone is being forced to pay ransom through some form or the other…endlessly.

They find it safer to stay alive by buying every second of their life by paying extortion money, paying quadruple taxes on every item of day-to-day use, doing without electricity and water supply, acquiescing to each brazen demand by militant syndicates and certain state elements, by turning a blind eye to the various false propaganda being used to drum up audible and paid support and most importantly by keeping their mouth shut.

What if militancy has become a way of life with many collaborating with the militant syndicates and making it big financially? What if the common people have to starve just to ensure their children stay outside Manipur to get a proper education? What if sending their children outside the state many a time means exposing them to the risk of oft repeated discriminatory crimes like murder and rape? What if they wish the state had proper and functioning educational institutions so the expense incurred was cut to the tenth?

What if many of the state's intellectuals are acutely aware of the fact that militancy is driving investors away from the state, thereby nipping all developmental activities in the bud? What if the state's native professionals working outside wish there were a conducive environment back home where they could serve their own people without having to deal with the uneducated thugs in various militant syndicates who have never learnt the value and dignity of honest hard work?

The common people have learnt to live a dreaded life of silent suffering and to die a quiet death with all their cherished dreams unfulfilled. No one ever cared for the common men's wishes and dreams—during their lifetime or in death. Their side of the story has always been bundled into the dark backroom of oblivion in the atmosphere of myriad armed enterprises spawned by a few people's greed for power and money. It is hence a fallacy that common men are stupid. Silence is not stupidity. That is why they chose the lesser devils that at least have some semblance of education, legitimacy, order and control.

Mr. Ibobi did not have to congratulate himself on his "feat", neither was Mrs. Sonia Gandhi supposed to pat him on the back with yet another punishing five-year term in the state. Both Mr. Ibobi and Mrs. Gandhi should dig down deep into the psyche of the Manipuri people if at all they had the least genuine concern for the people. If they really cared for the people, they should have given the reins to a more educated and more honest leader.

But then, maybe they were rendered helpless by the absence of any such deserving leader among the current breed of state politicians. Or that politics and militancy in the state, self-serving as they are by nature, are co-synergistic entities, far removed from the reality of the common people's sufferings, hopes and aspirations, and angst.

Being a common man, I do not expect my words to reach the ears of the concerned, unless their purpose is to finish me off. I probably have no other rights as a human being than keeping my mind and mouth shut.