No Chakkouba but Meitei Sareng bought for religious purposes
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, November 17 2023: Despite the plunge in sale of fish including Meetei Sareng this Ningol Chakkouba festival, many still bought the fish for religious purposes, said fish farmer Chungkham Kopeshwar Meetei.

The fish-farmer who is involved in the labour-intensive endeavour of rearing Meetei Sareng was bom to Late Chungkham Thambou Meetei from Wangoi Makha Leikai in Imphal West district and served for 22 years in the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) before taking voluntary retirement.

Subsequently, he took up fish farming at his residence.

Speaking to The Sangai Express, Chungkham Kopeshwar Meetei shared that he reached out to Sapam Jiten, Inspector, Fisheries Department and Late fish farmer L Dhanachandra for Sareng fingerlings.

Thus, he started out with rearing 44 fingerlings imported from Kolkata and Bangladesh from August 26 of 2021, which he purchased at the rate of Rs 80 per fingerling.

Then from July 30 of 2022 he began rearing around 14,000 Sareng fingerlings imported from Myanmar.

However, out of the 14,000 fingerlings, he ended up keeping 11,000 for himself and gave some to one fish farmer N Basanta from Khordak village, 300 fingerlings to Chief Minister N Biren Singh's wife Hiyainu and the remaining to the officials of Fisheries Department.

After a year of rearing, the fingerlings grew to weigh between 2 kg to 4.5 kg, said Chungkham Kopeshwar.

One kg of Meetei Sareng is usually sold for Rs 1500 in the market but it is not readily available and in cases where certain individuals wish to purchase Meetei Sareng from the farm for religious purposes then they are sold for Rs 3000 per kg.

This is because the fish farmer has to hire six extra hands to catch the fish from the pond and also rent fishnets.

It is a very labour intensive process, he explained.

However, for purposes of rearing, the Sareng fingerlings are sold for Rs 2000 per kg.

He further pointed out that in rearing Meetei Sareng, many other varieties of fishes, including Tung-hanbi (Tilapia), have to be fed to them, to avoid the fishes feeding on each other, he conveyed.

So far, he has sold around 200 Meetei Sareng and about 1000 Sareng remain in his farm.

The fish farmer then went on to comment on Chief Minister N Biren Singh's announcement in 2021 to provide loans with 50 per cent grant to fish farmers who produce local Sareng.

Maintaining that the State Government has not provided the funds till date, he pointed out that this expensive variety of fish could be sold at a lower price to the public if the Government had disbursed the funds.

Aside from Meetei Sareng, Kopeshwar also rears other varieties of fishes in his farm including Nunga, Ngapai etc.

He asserted that though they do sell fish on many other occasions, the fish farmers breed the Meetei Sareng for a long time in preparation for Ningol Chakkouba as it is one of the biggest festivals in the State and sales of Sareng sky rocket during this time.

However, this year the public has foregone the Ningol Chakkouba celebration due to the ongoing conflict and the suffering it has brought to the community.

As the festival has largely been cancelled, the annual fish mela has also been scrapped.

Thus, the sale of fishes which the fish farmers have reared with a great deal of hard work have gone to waste, shared Kopeshwar.

On the other hand, fish farmers who procured their fingerlings through loans provided by the State Government are in a bind as their fish remain largely unsold and the loan amounts unpaid, he lamented.

Comment