Youth and Contemporary Issues
(Depoliticisation of youths and its impact in the social change)
- Part 2 -

Dr. Dhanabir Laishram *

CONFLICT SITUATION AND ITS IMPACT ON HIGHER EDUCATION

Conflict situation in Manipur means contradiction between recolonisation and decolonisation. In a simple language, non state actors claimed that Manipur was colonised by India after occupying coercively without the consent of the State Legislative Assembly of 1948, the members of the house, who were elected by the people based on adult franchise.

After that Armed Forces Special Power Act 1958 was imposed to Manipur and deployed army, Para-military, border security force and CRPF. All the characteristics of colonization like accommodation of surplus population, extraction of raw materials, captive market economy, and violation of human rights could be seen in Manipur.

So they are in the process of decolonization by waging war against India as resistance movement with arms. So robotically unwanted incidents and worsen atmosphere of political violence and political crudeness as lawless state are coming up.

As impact of this political violence it severely hurts to the students of both lower and higher education in Manipur. So long time academic calendar could not be followed. Attendants are low owing to bundh and strikes, maximum number of students is in the outside of the state, maximum of them are going down in the drug abuses and some of them are counting the days for death.

These are part of counter insurgency measures taken by both the union and the state government. So now the students are sandwich in between state and non state actors. They are facing a lot of problems including wanton human rights violation. Even students were killed by security personnel with their school bags.

They were detained at the roadside, lining on the ground in the combing operation, detained in the army camp if the security forces suspect them. In this environment no one could imagine better education for them. It was happened and would be happened again because of continuing political violence in the state. Even during their exam they have heard sound of the guns and blasting of bombs. In this situation they are compelled to study by hook or crook.

Now the pertinent question is that who architect this nasty social and political environment. The answer of this question is the objective of this paper. So my papers deals with some of the crucial issues like students in the carrot and stick measures, students in the Neo-Liberalism, depoliticisation and its consequences, role of students to bring another world is possible.

The notable thing is that whenever we have any proposition in any issue no one can discard the neocolonial process of Liberlisation, Privatisation and Glovalisation. All of us including non state actors are in the process of LPG.

In any society the potential human capitals are the students, who try to see the world through the window of education for being social, political, economic actors, scientist, sports persons, peasants and workers. In other words they are the parents of tomorrow. So the young generation occupies a special place in social environment.

They are vital part of society. The young and rising generation constitutes a representative of the future in the broadest sense; the future of any society depends on the practical politicising of the youth. They have to educate for understanding of general system and political awareness then in politics in order to understand policy. After that they should make interaction and reaction with the existing political system if the ruling elites deviate from the willingness of the masses.

That is the real citizen in this modern society. There is no political formula to affirm that student should not join politics. That was British political formula applied to India for colonising so long time as they like. It should not be applied to India today particularly to Manipur also.

All societies pay special attention to the students. No challenges for possession of national characters can be victorious without the effective education, organisation and mobilisation of the youth into effective action. So my first attempt in this paper is to find out students' role to our society and to education then conflict situation and its impact on higher studies.

My proposition is that I don't like to give generally sharing views on youths, mainly students and society instead it's better to highlight the reality of their sufferings because of conflict situation and its significance in our country in general and NE in particular. My presentation is based on logical inquiry with observation and interpretation.

Consequences of Depoliticisation:

While sarcasm towards democratic politics among the masses created a depoliticized mainstream, reactionary hate politics of various shades reappeared in our country more overtones to the states of NE, which are neglected in all sectors. This has been in keeping with the growing space of identity-based politics in the period of globalization.

While globalization has widened inequalities, the section of society facing oppression and discrimination on grounds of race, caste, gender, language, religion, nationalism etc. have been at a greater disadvantage. Marginalization of these oppressed sections, in terms of economic opportunities, has been complemented by increasing instances of physical violence and hate crimes against them.

The most common form of hatred politics witnessed in the NE as part of capitalist country is racial attacks directed against non-NE and immigrants – because they are stealing their jobs and spoiling their culture. Moreover neo-fascistic sectarian and communal violence of various kinds have witnessed a rise. Not surprisingly all energetic and potential youths have been at the forefront as well as at the receiving end of such violence.

Majoritarian hatred politics has provoked its extremist counterparts within minority groups too. Terrorism of various shades, particularly those based on religion, is a complex phenomenon, which has several underlying historical, political and geo-strategic factors. However, a notable aspect of terrorism is that most terrorist – especially those who carry out dreadful attacks killing innocent civilians – are young people.

While many of them sign up out of the desperation of poverty and unemployment, some educated youth, even middle- class professionals, have been drawn into terrorist activities too which points towards the ideological appeal of religious fundamentalism.

This can also be seen as the most extreme form of depoliticisation, where both the status quo as well as any vision for progressive social change has been rejected in favour of a thoroughly reactionary ideology, which simply fills one with hatred towards other faiths and dehumanises their followers.

The final result of depoliticisation thus lies in barbarism induced by hate politics of various hues. Solidarity is far cry but enmity among the people of NE is more and more increasing. Some of them dream about supra state body instead of giving common aspiration of supra state organisation. So the two options – unite and perish are reflected in the minds of the organic intellectuals. Here also our youths open their eyes and try to give more political space to them.


to be continued .....