[Assam] Sentinel editorial

[umesh sharma]

I wonder why would there be attack on newcomers ISKCON in the state and not on foerign Christian missionaries over the decades. Who is attacking whom?
   
  Umesh

Ram Sarangapani <assamrs at gmail.com> wrote:
    Bikash Sarmah makes some very good points and has been able to differentiate between an 'insurgent' and a 'terrorist'. 
   
   
   
  Given This Brand of Insurgency
THE REALITY MIRROR
Bikash Sarmah 
T he grenade attack on the International Society for 
Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) temple in 
Imphal last Wednesday when ISKCON devotees 
were celebrating Janmasthami, is yet another reminder of the changing face of terrorism in the Northeast. There are discerning observers and commentators in the Northeast who are averse to using the word ''terrorism'' to describe the militias in the region. They would rather call it ''insurgency'', theorizing — pretty convincingly too — the conflict in the region as the one that stems from a sense of alienation of the people from the Indian mainstream, a sense of a ''colonial'' India exploiting the innocent masses here, a sense of history that would narrate the romanticized tales of freedom of the past that seems to be lost now, and, of course, a deep sense of fear of the gradual loss of ethnic and indigenous identities. There are columnists who argue that since what is being witnessed in the Northeast is not terrorism but insurgency, the only way out is political solution, not a military one. True, the country's armed forces, who otherwise defend the borders and become
 martyrs, fighting valiantly the enemies of the nation, should not be seen fighting and killing their own countrymen. But it is also equally true that 'insurgents' are not expected to kill their own civilian brethren — as randomly and bestially as the savage terrorist would do. They, as 'liberators' and 'revolutionaries', are not expected to extort money from the ones who earn money of sheer hard work, and to run an industry of sorts, quite lucrative, quite easy — because it is so easy to threaten unarmed civilians to loot them — and hence quite sustainable. Surely, then, our 'insurgents' are not expected to cross that thin line of difference between insurgency and terrorism in their own whims and fancies just because it suits them so — to be insurgents when they invoke history, to be terrorists when they want to make their presence felt. 
This long introduction to this column is deemed necessary because, over the time, some self-styled experts on insurgency and conflict resolution have grown and 'matured' in this region, who would not acknowledge the impossibility of conflict resolution at a time when the contours of the very conflict seem to be ever-changing, ever-stretching, and quite arbitrarily at that. There have to be better theories to tackle the menace, let alone solve the so-called problem or issue. My considered opinion is that there cannot be a political solution to attacks like the one at the ISKCON temple in Imphal; there can still be a political solution, but if and only if the framework that would yield a political formula is so worked on that there may be scope to call our insurgents sheer terrorists as and when they become terrorists. The theory is refreshingly simple: when an insurgent throws grenade at a place of worship or a busy market place or buses and trains, he instantly becomes a
 terrorist — cowardly. When he kills women and children, he is a terrorist whose cowardice knows no lower bound. But when an insurgent fights open battles with the state — its armed forces — because his insurgency is against the state and its machinery, he remains an insurgent. The fight has to be open — it is meaningless to talk of even guerrilla warfare. So how many insurgents do you have here? 
The All Manipuri Students' Union (AMSU) did well by calling the ISKCON attack ''an act of terrorism''. It could not be otherwise. The most interesting thing to have happened in the wake of the attack was some prominent Manipuri militant outfits coming out with statements denying their role in the attack and condemning it. The first to have done so was the Revolutionary People's Front (RPF) — the political wing of the People's Liberation Army (PLA). According to reports, an RPF spokesman told the media that his outfit considered such attacks ''thoughtless and cowardly''. The United National Liberation Front (UNLF) also denied its hand in the attack. Later, even the ones against whom fingers were being pointed, such as the People's Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK) and the Kanglei Yawol Kanba Lup (KYKL), denied their involvement. These denials are interesting because they show how restless the militant outfits in the region become when the occasion comes to them to
 prove their insurgency characteristics. They also know it well that such occasions are rare, and that one needs to perfect the art of identifying the best occasion. For, these are the occasions when public anger runs high — even against insurgency. These are the occasions when an alert and active civil society as Manipur's (remember those elderly Manipuri women stripping naked in full public view to protest Thangjam Manorama's brutal rape and murder by Assam Rifles jawans in 2004?) would question the very basis of militant violence in much the same way as they would question state violence. It is quite natural, then, that following the ISKCON temple attack, blogs on the internet surfaced, with ''challenge'' to the militants involved in the dastardly act, asking them to reveal their identity and ''fight man-to-man''. It surely cannot be a response to insurgency or any liberation movement. It is a response to terrorism. And 'insurgents' find it hard to accept such response
 of the civil society. 
There is another theory doing the rounds. It is that the attack on the ISKCON temple is an outburst of the Meitei frustration at the growing ''Indianization'' of Manipuri culture and tradition. In the wake of the attack, some internet blogs had messages that glorified the attack as the one that would protect the indigenousness of the Manipuris. Such messages must have emboldened outfits like the KYKL that calls itself a 'social' organization (no truly social organization would tread the path of violence) and is leading the campaign of Meitei revival. While one cannot dismiss endeavours for the revival of indigenous culture in a State like Manipur, it does not require one to attack a temple of a religious sect that does not believe in and that does not have any proselytizing mission — unlike the thriving missionaries all around us in this region. If there are Westerners in the ISKCON movement, it is all because of their spiritual — not religious — prerogatives; much in the
 same way as scores of Westerners thronged Osho Rajneesh's lecture rooms to hear his sex-to-superconsciousness discourses, beyond ritualistic Hinduism or, for that matter, any other faith. After all, the most secular spirit on earth would have one follow his or her own ideals according to the choice-of-reason theory. Can anyone point out that the ISKCON movement is about forced conversion? And is the rich and pristine Manipuri culture, nay the Meitei discourse, at the mercy of ISKCON 'propagandists'? Can the ISKCON movement corrupt any indigenous culture? Yes, it can, but if and only if the indigenous people do not bother about rediscovering their rich past or do not know how to go about the very path of rediscovery. Culture and tradition, if adhered to in utmost sincerity and awareness of the changing needs and conditions of the present, are unassailable. This, however, is lost on the gun-toting species for whom guns and grenades may be the only way to a bizarre variety of
 salvation. All said and done, the most vital question remains: was the ISKCON attack masterminded by the jihadis fostered by our 'friendly' neighbours, Bangladesh and Pakistan, in tandem with our own 'insurgents' or on their own? At the time of writing this piece, the question remains unanswered. But anything is possible, given the brand of insurgency in this region. And yes, we have not heard of 'insurgents' fighting the jihadis. They would not, perhaps — all for the sake of the matrix of insurgency-jihad equations! (The writer is the Consulting Editor of The Sentinel) 
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Umesh Sharma
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 1-202-215-4328 [Cell Phone]

Ed.M. - International Education Policy
Harvard Graduate School of Education,
Harvard University,
Class of 2005

weblog: http://jaipurschool.bihu.in/
 		
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