Double Standard

In his speech on 28th foundation day of the outfit, RPF (Revolutionary People’s Front) President used words like Oppressors and Oppressed. The other vocabulary, one often comes across is Colonial Rulers & Ruled. Now, we need to understand the meaning of the word Colonial. It is an adjective of the word Colony meaning a country or area under the political control of another country and occupied by settlers from that country. Here, we all are born & brought up in this land and some amongst us have been chosen our political leaders by none else but us.
The dichotomy of the fact, who is oppressor and who is ruler is left to the readers after they finish reading this write-up. In this region, we have so many outfits, each trying to establish its supremacy over the other to retain control over small part of the territory. Before the readers conclude, I would request them to view some of the recent incidents that may be fresh in their minds. Wails of kith & kin of 16 IRB men, killed in an inhumanly attack; have gone unheard by the miscreants. Execution of Ningthounjam Malemkhomba, of Iroisemba by PREPAK on charges of extortion. Not to forget the extortion, the outfit undertakes. Death of Kangujan Maimu Devi, 40 of Uripok as a result of torture by suspected UGs after she had been summoned by them at Thoubal Haokha. UNLF appreciated KCP for accepting the responsibility of shooting General Secretary of All Manipur Working Journalist, Ratan Luwangche, and apologizing thereafter. It was lauded as an act of good discipline. Issue of diktat to the press for suppressing some news pertaining to the outfits. We are
also aware of the involvement of the outfits dictating terms to the candidates and voters in recent Manipur elections.
Recently, about 300 members of Kuki Student Organisation (KSO) staged a rally in Parliament Street, New Delhi, protesting the oppression of Kukis, by UNLF, in Chandel district of South Manipur. They claimed that 30 people have died in land mine explosions planted by UNLF and many more have been maimed. In the words of James Guite, a native of Khenjoi village and a PhD scholar at Jawaharlal Nehru University, “The villagers are surrounded by land mines. They cannot go to the field or contact any one”. They requested the PM to free them from the clutches of UNLF. Troops of Assam Rifles averted a pre poll tragedy when they apprehended a UNLF cadre, named Okendra, with IED weighing 10 kg. He had been tasked to plant it in a polling booth at Churachandpur to cause large scale casualties. The list of such incidents is endless.
I will quote an example of a child that moved my heart.
Chingkhenganbi Mayengbam( aged 7 yrs) is the youngest poet in Manipur . She writes only sad poems at this tender age of fun and frolic. She says “I have become habituated to sad things happening around me. From the newspapers I come to know that lots of people are killed. Everything is so sad here” It will not be wrong to quote a small poem of hers with an amateur translation. “Laihouba mayam thoklakie, Meeyam pumba wannre. Toklo waraba Manipurda lan, Lan touba toklo. Shanti oina hingminnarasi. Poknapham Ima Manipu ase, Nungaihallasi. Nungaiba punsi ama oihallasi, Hey Manipur, Ima lamdam Manipur”
(Translation: Many revolutionaries have come out, people are suffering. Stop war in wretched Manipur, stop making wars. Let us live together in peace, let us make our motherland Manipur happy. Let us create a happy Manipur, my mother land Manipur)
We are aware that these outfits are trying to suppress their own kith & kin belying the cause they claim to fight for. Effort is to misguide the simple, peace loving and God fearing population of the region for vested interests. Are these outfits not intimidating hapless locals? Are they not extorting themselves? What right they have to execute some one when they cannot bring back the dead? What right they have to torture people to death? With the foregoing, I will leave the readers to have own impressions, who is ruling who and who is oppressing who?
“Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding” ‘Albert Einstein’