CorCom's general strike on 'Black Day'
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, October 11 2014 :
As in the previous years, the Coordination Committee (CorCom) has called a general strike all over Manipur from 0 hour to 1800 hours (6 pm) of October 15 which the committee has been observing as National Black Day every year.
A statement issued by the committee's media coordinator H Poirei maintained that Manipur was forcibly merged into the Indian Union on October 15, 1949 .
The Manipur State Constitution Act 1947 was drafted fully by July 26, 1947 just before the departure of British rulers from Manipur (Kangleipak).
After the sovereignty of Manipur was handed over to king Bodhachandra, the Manipur State Constitution Act 1947 was put into effect as the first step of establishing an elected Government.
The first election of independent Manipur was held in June 1948 and the first Council of Ministers elected through adult franchise were sworn in on October 18, 1948 at the Darbar Hall, Kangla.
Overlooking the democratically elected Council of Ministers, Indian leaders kept king Bodhachandra at Shillong under house arrest and the king was forced to sign on the Manipur Merger Agreement on September 29, 1949 under duress in the most undemocratic manner.
Subsequently, Manipur was annexed into the Indian Union on October 15, 1949, CorCom stated.
However, people of Manipur opposed the Manipur Merger Agreement and they have waging wars of liberation movements generation after generations.
The Manipur Merger Agreement has been deliberated repeatedly and threadbare across Manipur at different public meetings and one common resolution of all these consultations and meetings is that it was not merger but forcible annexation.
All these meetings after minutely studying the Manipur State Constitution Act 1947, relevant international laws and other documents came to the conclusion that the Manipur Merger Agreement was invalid, is invalid and would always remain invalid, said the statement.
Any organ of the UN does not permit aggression or annexation.
In the event of forcible annexation, the UN, at certain instances, freed the colonised country using military forces.
The right to self determination is guaranteed by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
It was in line with the right to self determination that Greece became independent from Ottoman Empire, Belgium from the Netherlands and also the creation of Bangladesh, Guinea Bissau, Indonesia, North Korea and Palestine.
The people's demand to live independently, away from any foreign control is their right.
But this very fundamental right of the people of Manipur is being violated by the Government of India, it alleged.
The ongoing revolutionary movement is about liberation of Manipuri people and to put Manipur in the race for development and progress, claimed the Coordinating Committee while urging all the people to support and join the liberation movement.
Medical and emergency services, media and religious activities would be exempted from the purview of the general strike, it added.