Behiang Bus Accident: Who to blame..?

Yesterday afternoon, as I sat down to write a post for my blog I get a phone call telling me there’s yet another road mishap near Behiang. This is the fourth time, and the second most fatal accident that happened in this stretch of 25 km road between Behiang and Singngat since December 2006, when I happened to be one of the victims.

Yesterday’s accident take place not more than half a kilometre from Behiang while the bus was on its way to the border village, allegedly when its tyre punctured and the driver lost control. 4 people died and 36 were injured, some of them are in a very critical condition. The injured were taken to District Hospital by the Indian Army posted in Behiang.

It may be recalled that in January 17 this year altogether 23 passengers died and 32 were injured in an accident not very far from Behiang after the over loaded truck in which they travelled fell into the Ngasuan Creek while attempting to cross a wooden bridge. That accident is still very much fresh in the mind of the villagers around the area since they had never seen such magnitude of tragedy, and not only that, because some of the victims are crippled for life and some yet to recuperate even to this day.

This accident is a double insult to the victims of the truck accident, the people of Behiang and its area, and to the Zo Tribals living in the area. After the January accident, we expected the Authorities to learn their lessons and swing into action, but instead, nothing was learned, nothing was done, and above all, they did the most insulting things by pocketing a certain percentage of the Compensation meant for the Death Victims!

I’m speechless even when I think about it. How ruthless, how horrible and how disgusting we have become! And after the second accident of this year causing the life of 27 people and the livelihood of hundreds, I’m furious…

Are we allowed to point fingers? Yes, indeedy, I shall-

• First, the MLA should resign for neglecting his constituency and not learning his lessons even after the worst road mishap in the history of Churachandpur district happened right under his nose just 4 months ago.
• The Transport Minister, the Social Welfare Minister and the Tribal Development Minister should also take equal blame for not doing their part and thus making such accidents a normal situation.
• The Chief Minister and the whole of the Congress led government for allowing millions of money being drained away for a road project that only fattened some contractors.
• And yes, the alcoholic Chief of Behiang should also take responsibility. As a chief who collected taxes, she is responsible for the welfare of her people. She could have done something.
• The Contractor who take large amount of money to build the road, and the PWD workers who took salary to maintain the road but are living somewhere in Lamka, they all should be publicly lynched.
• The driver and owner of the Bus should be held for Homicide for intentionally putting their bus first and not the safety of their passengers.

The CJM of Churachandpur should take a suo moto cognizance of the issue, because, if the problem was not taken care of immediately, an accident a day will become a daily issue. And, for a change, why doesn’t any one of us file an FIR with the police, or a PIL (Public Interest Litigation) on behalf of the public? Hopefully some sort of rationality must still exist with our judiciary system.

This is the rudest wake-up call for the Authorities, hopefully they wake up… hopefully they will do something to make up for failing us all, time and again.

India - Cricket - Racism

The Gentlemen Sports of Cricket is at it once again. After the whole of mainland Indian vehemently defended Harbhajan Singh in the ‘that-could-never-happened’ incident in Australia, two coloured cheer-leaders hired by an IPL team’s event management group alleged that they had been told to leave the ground because they had the ‘wrong skin colour’.

If that shocking attitude was not ranked as racism, what does? Mainland Indians, who want to think themselves as pariah during the British rule, often mistake themselves to be in the forefront of war against racism. Not only that, people often think of India as a multi-religious, multi-cultural, racially tolerant country. That is not so true.

Mainland Indians’ anti-racist gestures come out of the woodwork only when they perceived themselves as the target, or if it happened in the west. Just take a look at the Shilpa Shetty’s or the Lakshmi Mittal’s issues.

They stereotyped themselves only as possible victim that they forget to look home and notice that they are ruthless perpetrator themselves. If you don’t understand what I meant, you don’t have to look further than the 10 pages of matrimonial advertisements coming with your newspaper every morning.

Mainland Indian should know that what they often ‘pass-off’ as casteism, regionalism, class-ism, etc, are prejudicial and discriminatory by nature. Around the world, people think India is coming off age, but it won’t unless it learned to take discrimination, casteism and racism as a threat and not minor issues to be conveniently swept under the carpet.

Hemraj: Redeemed by Death?

The recent twin brutal murder in Noida once again, not only brings out the negligence of Indian Police Forces, but also its stark prejudice. The Noida Police, apart from failing in every aspect, were quick to point their finger at their missing Nepali Servant Hemraj who all the while had been decomposing in the roof-top.

It is very disturbing to think of the possible situation for the Nepali Help if circumstances had spared him with his life. With the police attitude, it is apparent that no matter what, he would spend his life in Jail if he had been alive.

It is sad to see the media failing to highlight this sort of prejudiced mind-set of the police. By highlighting this issue, the media could have done much for the minority communities living in the main land and had been victim of discrimination based on prejudice.

Manipur among the Best Place to be a Mother in India!!?

On mother’s day, a leading newspaper in Delhi published the result of a survey listing the best states to be a mother in, and it nearly shocked me when I saw Manipur in the top three. It definitely amused me –shall I believe it or call it a sham! What do our women folks have in their favour that the rest of India seems to lack? I try to find some reasonable answer, apart from the slight difference in cultural factor and higher awareness level (I want to believe this), the three main criteria seems to be far-fetched for Manipur.

The survey was conducted by ‘Save the Children’, an NGO that compiled the data from the National Health and Family Survey 3 (NHFS), and the Sample Registration System (SRS) bulletin. Their main three criteria were: infant mortality rates (IMR), antenatal care and institutional deliveries.

I have no details of the survey, so I cannot comment on which sector did our women scored their points. But I think it must be Infant Mortality Rates since the other two criteria are not the stuff Manipur is known of. Even though I don’t have any supporting data, there certainly are some reasons to believe that the mortality rate of Manipur is lower than the other states even with simple observation.

Apart from that, most of the north-eastern states have strong and liberated women compared to mainland women, educational achievement may not be higher, but overall literacy rate is definitely higher, and thus awareness. High awareness level in every aspect of life is important since it helps us prepare for whatever that comes and help us make the right choice.

Institutional deliveries and antenatal care, on the other hand, are still on the stage of dreams for the women of Manipur. Whatever antenatal cares they got are within their own capacity and effort, and there are very, very few institutions where women can deliver or approach for cares even in cases of complications.

In fact, there are very few women from the rural area, especially in Churachandpur district, who came up to the district hospital for, forget about weekly, monthly check-up or even to deliver. Delivery as well as antenatal cares were taken care-of at home. May be this is the reason why Infant Mortality Rate is low in Manipur.

This survey seems to prove that our traditional practices and cares of pregnant women –before, during and after delivery are not unhealthy or unprofessional. It seems our mothers knows as much as those goddamned nurses who don’t do their jobs. Kudos to our woman, they know how to take care of themselves and, oh yes, the family! Strong Women, God bless them all (excluding the Nurses and Doctors)!!!

As I can see, it may not be too presumptuous to say that the National Health and Family Survey-3’s data were rigged or the Manipur government must have supplied imaginary data since it is a rare sight to see a functioning Primary Health Centres in the rural areas of Manipur, and since most of the nurses and doctors posted in the rural areas have happily lived in their respective home irrespective of where their home is. Oh! I might just add ‘happily ever after’ –with no works and no one to pull them up!

A Heady Cocktail called Zo Unification

It had been a long time, long before I was born, the drums of unification was first heard in our land. Even today, the sound can still be heard and it is as hollow as was then. And most of you optimistic folks won’t disagree that it don’t sound too pessimistic to say that the drum is too hollow, too dull and too damp to make much noise even today.

In this age of globalization and generalization, when the issues of identity, nationality and other personal lives take the backseat; when humanity are reduced to mere consumers, and when the borders are but a blurred line in their atlas, we, the Zomi, are endangered. Violence makes much noise, but that is not the best option for us or for that matter for anyone. We need more than mere noise, but loud, sensible and intelligent voices that will be heard far and beyond, and we all know that a handful of men don’t make much noise.

What we need right now is a common identity without which there can be no unity. Without unity, there can be no common voices and no common causes. And without all that, all our dreams, our hopes and our fights will mean nothing. Different voices coming from different corner doesn’t make enough noise, but different voices coming from the same platform does make a loud sound. And a common identity is that platform.

Some would argue that we already have had a common generic identity, but I want to assure them that the identity that they talk about is recognized nowhere in this world. When I talk about a common identity, I don’t count the assumptions that you made. By common identity, I mean, an identity that is identifiable with a distinct name, distinct tribe, and a distinct area of inhabitation with the same pattern of life, practice and tradition, and is recognizable as well as legally recognized by the world.

The saddest part is that we already had that ‘common identity’ I talked about and the only thing is we don’t want to adopt it. It is appalling to know that instead of relishing our potentiality to unleash and command unequalled power within the region by being united, we try to swallow each other while some of us still vigorously try to assert their presence within our own community.

Someone once told me our core issue could very well be recognizing the existence of smaller clans, linguistic groups and tribes within the larger ‘Zo’ community, which could lead to stabilization. I beg to differ on some nuances; firstly, that is the very reasons we are fighting each other, secondly ghettoizing on linguistic basis will defeat the very purpose of common identity and it is also dangerous (remember ’97), and thirdly, we are not the Nagas (we are much closer than that).

Clan is something that we cannot throw away, but language is a process that evolve non-stop. There’s no denying that ’97 got 97% to do with linguistic, but one thing that must be noted is that when it comes to communicating with each other, we never caught ourselves in the tower of Babel. And if we stopped ghettoizing and co-existed freely and peacefully, there is a chance that the Babel will fall down on its own. That definitely is better than our numerous dialects die a death of obscurity; after all, it’s not your clan but the dialect that you speak that decides where you belonged.

For us, the Zomi, to start building a common identity will be a mammoth as well as minor task. On the one hand, we shared everything in common for so long that we hardly see our differences and always think of ourselves as brothers and sisters, while on the other hand, we had never been united (in the form of nation or state) and even today, we take our own adopted path with our own adopted identity.

If the Zomi had been united, or at least organized to some extend, the course of history may have been different. If we had been organized with one voice, there possibly is no way that a tribe or linguistic groups that occupied so vast a span of the empire can be ignored by the British at the time of leaving the sub-continent. It only means nobody take notice of us. And taking into consideration the rate at which we consume ourselves in selfish pursuit of personal gains, unification seems to be a far cry.

Within the given situation right now, drumming for unification is like Dahpa’s Jhum. If we are serious about unification, why not start with the basic thing –a common identity. Paite, Zou, Simte, Sukte, Vaiphei, etc. are recognized tribes under the constitution of India, but when it comes to the common name 'Zomi' –no one bothers.

It will not be a mistake to say that the Zomi are not ready for any kind of unification. That simply, is evident from the communities’ unwillingness to discard our respective adopted identity as recognized by the government in favour of the more factually correct generic name of ‘Zomi’. It is a simple case of correcting an error though the legal process may be a long and winding one, but starting that process would only prove our sincerity.

It is time to share what we have in common as a Zomi and the tie that bind us together as our forefather symbolized it by the Hornbill, and stop pointing out our differences. Celebrating our diversity may be a good thing, but it is also one roadblock towards unification. Why don’t we put away the ‘I/me' and start doing something, even if we failed, at least it will give the next generation something to built their case on.

‘97 has brought about an atmosphere of suspicion and it does and will take a long time to built-up the hardly existing trust system between the communities. It may sounds hilarious when President Bush said “I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully”, but I’m not sure if it would be hilarious to says that we, the Zomi, can co-exist peacefully.