[Assam] A write-up by Udayan Mishra

[Ram Sarangapani]

Excellent Uttam, couldn't have expressed it better.

--Ram da




On Mon, Mar 2, 2009 at 9:13 PM, uttam borthakur
<uttamborthakur at yahoo.co.in>wrote:

> Chanda Da:
>
> You got me wrong there.
> The insurgents promise a better way of life, alternative to the extant
> tyranny. But always end up being brutal murderers without any agenda other
> than money (or playing into the hands of the system they say they are trying
> to uproot) and kill persons liked by the people at large to sub-serve the
> vested interests of the system itself.They become terrorists bereft of any
> mass support. In fact they act in cross purposes with that of people and
> make hasty insincere retreats when they face people's ire: NSCN denouncing
> this killing, ULFA denouncing Lakhimpur blasts, ULFA denying killing of
> Kamala Saikia............In all they do not give people an alternative to
> choose from apart from flowery speeches like any other politician.
>
> In so far as 'Bhukute Kol Nopoke' aside, I like to say that the social
> dynamics is so innumerably multi-factor that whether the  effort would end
> in desired result is always a big question unless the whole universe
> conspires for you.... kol pokibo ne nai tare thik nai.... but true to human
> spirit everyone by volition should/ would labour towards  a better tomorrow.
> The killers of Dr. T. Kishan Singh were also perhaps thinking that they were
> doing great for the people of Manipur. Prof Mishra's article points at
> possible connivance of the state bureaucracy / politicians too. NSCN-Manipur
> bureaucrat/politician nexus, does this sound radical Chandan Da?
>
> Now please do not assign any bad influence my thinking process:-)
>
> Uttam Kumar Borthakur
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Chan Mahanta <cmahanta at charter.net>
> To: A Mailing list for people interested in Assam from around the world <
> assam at assamnet.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, 3 March, 2009 3:19:55 AM
>  Subject: Re: [Assam] A write-up by Udayan Mishra
>
> Hi Uttam:
>
>
> > Why of the 'heedlessness' was not in the pale and ambit of Mr. Udayan
> Mishra's write-up, or was it? Also, it should be understood that The Assam
> Tribune restricts the length of an article to a given number of lines, words
> and columns. Just as we are discussing Mr. Mishra's article, views may
> crystalise and this may impel someone to act in a given direction.
>
>
> *** It is , more than anything else, the culture of symbolic gestures , of
> homage paying, serving as a substitute for real thing that our
> intelligentsia is unable to dig out from under.
>
> Nothing  wrong with paying homage to the brave  going down fighting.
>
> But to hope for change from the sacrifice,in this case the supreme
> sacrifice,  of the lonely crusader, is  absurd. It is, at best, an immature
> and uninformed  reaction. The obvious place to seek it is the power
> establishment, the 'legitimate' government. It is a no-brainer.
>
> Then why is that it was ignored?
>
> Simple: It is easy to go brow-beating the insurgents. It asserts one
> righteousness, avoids annoying the power structure  and helps bury the
> highly uncomfortable (but obvious to anyone willing and able to see)  nature
> of the dysfunctional desi governance. For if one goes after it, it ends up
> giving legitimacy to those whom the article is primarily designed to attack
> and discredit, isn't it?
>
>
> And not because the AT's limit on word count.
>
> Finally, I think it will be  more than a tad bit frivolous to try to plea :
> Bhukute' koltw nopoke' . Time for invoking that has been past decades ago.
>
> c-da
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> At 7:48 AM +0530 3/2/09, uttam borthakur wrote:
> > As Ms Patricia Mukhim had pointed out, 'insouciance' may be the problem.
> Such desensitisation pervades every sphere. But it never stopped anyone from
> discussing "slumdog' and the squalor. Also, there are certain things that
> are really puzzling in human behaviour ( remember Yudhisthir approaching the
> water hole in Mahabharata), such as, the 'impatience' that all expected
> changes would come about in one's own life-time. There may be a lull before
> the storm, who knows?
> >
> > Why of the 'heedlessness' was not in the pale and ambit of Mr. Udayan
> Mishra's write-up, or was it? Also, it should be understood that The Assam
> Tribune restricts the length of an article to a given number of lines, words
> and columns. Just as we are discussing Mr. Mishra's article, views may
> crystalise and this may impel someone to act in a given direction.
> >
> > So, i should think that patience and perseverence would augur well for
> everyone of us, especially the adults.
> >
> > Uttam Kumar Borthakur
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ________________________________
> > From: Chan Mahanta <cmahanta at charter.net>
> > To: A Mailing list for people interested in Assam from around the world <
> assam at assamnet.org>
> > Sent: Sunday, 1 March, 2009 9:59:52 PM
> > Subject: Re: [Assam] A write-up by Udayan Mishra
> >
> >>  >It is about the death of a young civil servant in Manipur. I thought
> assam netters would be interested. How efforts at good deeds are silenced by
> guns: state as well as militants. So, you may try the link below......
> >
> >
> > **** I was hoping to see some solutions to the problem, at least a
> discussion of.
> >
> > A lot of ink has been used to displaying one's own righteousness. But who
> challenged it?
> >
> > Cheap thrills is how I see the essay.
> >
> > Was  anyone debating, doubting, gloating over, or otherwise condoning a
> most senseless crime? Even NSCN( IM) has condemned the act, as the article
> says.
> >
> >
> > The author leaves no doubt about his own balanced sense of justice by
> painstakingly pointing out the perpetrators -- the insurgents and the state.
> How more balanced can one get? He pays flowing tributes to the Manipuri
> women , their  outrage and their fearless, ceaseless protests.
> >
> > Somewhere here must be lurking what their efforts have brought them.
> >
> > But why can't I find it?  Could it just be, therefore, that these are
> just as meaningless rites too? And why should it be meaningless, fruitless?
> Who should they be looking at for results? The good folks or the folks?
> Misra, incisively points out who the bad guys are. But where are the good
> guys? How does he see their role in these tragedies? Do they have any
> responsibility too? Could it be that he would not get into that, lest it
> dilutes his message?
> >
> > Standing out, by its absence, is any effort by the author to look at, if
> not suggest solutions,  into what leads to these acts of violence and death
> and how to put an end to it. In that it is, at best, yet another lot of idle
> blather.
> >
> > cm
> >
> >
> > PS: If I am not mistaken, this writer authored an article a few years
> ago, in which he exhorted the people of Assam to forsake the fantasy of the
> Seven Sisters, that the Assamese had nothing in common with the Nagas, the
> Mizos, the Khasis and so forth and argued the point that the notion of the
> Seven Sisters is a myth.  Has he found religion, or am I the one who is
> confused?
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > The tragedy of Manipur
> > - Udayon Misra
> > Dr Thingnam Kishan Singh, the young SDO of Kashom Khullen subdivision of
> Ukhrul district of Manipur, demonstrated a rare sense of integrity and
> courage as a civil service official. He decided to swim against the tide.
> Unlike most other government officials who have been unquestioningly obeying
> the diktats of the different militant groups, Kishan Singh stubbornly
> opposed the siphoning off of government funds into the coffers of the
> militants. Kishan believed passionately that development funds must go to
> the people. And, he paid with his life for his uprightness and idealism. On
> February 13, Dr Kishan Singh along with his driver, Aribam Rajen and a
> mandal, Yumnam Token Singh were abducted from front of the Deputy
> Commissioner's office at Ukhrul as they came out of a meeting. Four days
> later their bodies were discovered at Taphou Kuki village in Senapati
> district. They had been bludgeoned to death in a most brutal manner. The
> NSCN (I-M) was suspected of
> >  carrying out the abduction and murders and after initial denials the
> NSCN (I-M) admitted that three of its cadres were involved in the incident.
> Obviously, the militant outfit was unhappy at Kishan Singh's resolve not to
> allow development funds from being squandered by the militants and hence it
> decided to teach the young idealist officer a lesson. One was immediately
> reminded of the manner in which Sanjoy Ghose was abducted and killed by the
> ULFA because he demanded transparency in the release of funds meant for
> rural development programmes at Majuli.
> >
> > Had it not been the immediate public outcry following the discovery of
> the dead bodies of Kishan Singh and his colleagues, the incident would have
> perhaps been written off as yet another instance of militant killing in the
> state of Manipur. Manipur has been in the throes of violence for several
> decades now. But unlike many other states of the country where violence,
> both by the State and by insurgent outfits have come to be accepted with a
> stoic sense of resignation, in Manipur the people, especially its womenfolk,
> know how to protest every such killing. Women's organisations like the Meira
> Paibi have been in the forefront of such protests and women dressed in white
> and silently protesting violence and the deaths of innocents is a common
> sight in Imphal and other towns of Manipur. Not that these protests have
> resulted in immediate results. Entire Manipur was galvanized over the rape
> and murder of Thanjam Manorama by security personnel some years ago.
> >  Manipur's protest against that heinous deed was flashed throughout the
> country and abroad. But the culprits are yet to be punished. But the people
> of Manipur have not allowed the callousness and collaboration of the
> authorities in these inhuman acts of violence to dampen their spirits. They
> know in their heart of hearts that they must keep on protesting against all
> such acts, whether committed by the State or by the militant groups. So, the
> Joint Action Committee set up to protest the deaths of Kishan Singh and his
> colleagues has worked out an elaborate plan of action which is bound to keep
> people's opinion focused on the need to secure justice and get the
> perpetrators of this terrible crime duly punished. Who was Kishan Singh over
> whose murder entire Manipur has been galvanized into protest? So much so,
> that all organisations irrespective of clan and tribe loyalties have come
> out in one voice in demanding that the criminals masquerading as militants
>  be
> >  punished. The NSCN(I-M) which initially tried to disclaim
> responsibility, has now said that it has identified the killers who happen
> to be its cadres and that they are in its custody. With thousands of people
> demonstrating against the murder in the Tangkhul Naga dominated Ulkhrul
> district, the NSCN(I-M) leadership has now been forced to distance itself
> from this heinous deed by at least publicly disapproving the crime.
> >
> > Dr Thingnam Kishan Singh was no ordinary government official. In many
> senses, he was a symbol of the young and resurgent Manipur that is trying to
> come out of the clutches of almost endless violence. He had founded the
> "Centre for Alternative Discourse" and was the editor Alternative
> Perspectives, a scholarly journal which has created for itself a place among
> the intellectual world of the country. Each issue of this highly perceptive
> journal would carry an incisive essay by Kishen Singh and the topics ranged
> from critiquing India's Look East policy to the economics of
> underdevelopment. Sad to say, in Assam today we have few social science
> journals which would be able to compete with the one edited by Kishen Singh,
> either in the range of its topics or in the depth of its analysis. A topper
> in English Literature both at the undergraduate and the post-graduate level
> from the Jamia Milli Islamia University, Kishan started his teaching career
> at Delhi's
> >  Shyamlal College. But his urge to serve his own state of Manipur made
> him give up that job and come and join the prestigious DM College at Imphal.
> From there he moved to the Manipur University as a Lecturer. Then he took
> the Manipur Civil Service examination and joined the administration. As the
> SDO of a backward district, Kishen was bent on making development funds
> reach the people instead of the militants. His devotion to duty and
> unswerving loyalty to his ideals created problems for those who worked with
> him. The Joint Action Committee has accused the Deputy Commissioner and the
> Superintendent of Police of Ukhrul of having complicity in the crime. The
> Chief Minister Ibobi Singh has already suspended both of them for their
> failure to ensure protection to Kishen and his colleagues. Only a thorough
> and impartial enquiry will reveal the truth of the matter.
> >
> > It is rather strange that initially the murder of this leading
> intellectual and Manipur Civil Service official went virtually unreported in
> the regional press and media of our state. That much for our sentiments on
> the seven sisters being bonded with a common thread! It was only after life
> in Imphal and other towns came to a virtual halt because of massive people's
> protests against the murders and curfew had to be imposed, that the regional
> media gave some space to the incident. Quite often the regional media in
> Assam rightly accuses the national media of blacking out this region during
> moments of crisis. But, unfortunately, when it came to reporting this
> particular incident involving the abduction and murder of a leading
> intellectual of neighbouring Manipur, the regional press in Assam failed to
> give the incident due weightage. Those who knew Dr Kishen Singh would
> vouchsafe for not only his unflinching loyalty to the common people but also
> his urge to
> >  build a new Northeast where there would be more meaningful interaction
> and exchange between the different states and their people. The research
> foundation which he had started, the journal he edited and the discussions
> he initiated bear testimony to all this. He was one of those few who could
> successfully get out of the groove of localised thinking and relate his
> vision to happenings not only in this region or country but also in the
> wider world. This is exactly what he stated in his editorial in one of the
> volumes of his journal. His death in the hands of some criminals who try to
> pass off as "freedom fighters" but who are the real enemies of the people,
> has created a void which will be difficult to fill. I take this opportunity
> to pay my tribute to a young man who, unlike most of us, dared to do what he
> considered to be right.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > At 9:11 AM +0530 3/1/09, uttam borthakur wrote:
> >  > It is about the death of a young civil servant in Manipur. I thought
> assam netters would be interested. How efforts at good deeds are silenced by
> guns: state as well as militants. So, you may try the link below......
> >>
> >>  http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/details.asp?id=mar0109/edit2
> >>
> >>  Uttam Kumar Borthakur
> >>
> >>
> >>      Unlimited freedom, unlimited storage. Get it now, on
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> >
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