Childhood Dreams

To be a child again… what would I not give

Innocent and carefree

The world full of strange and exciting possibilities

Untainted, the mind – a blank slate

 

I see my son, all of 9 years old …. struggling to learn his lessons. He reminds me so much of my own childhood. Of course, he is a much better and faster learner than I ever was. But then, he lives in a world very different from the one I grew up in.

The sepia tinted memories of my own childhood come rushing back. Those days, Imphal was not the crowded, polluted shanty town it has become. Yes, it was a dusty shanty town even then, but it was not polluted or crowded like it is today.

My dad used to play Bridge with his friends at the Public Library most evenings. Sometimes, I would tag along and spend my time watching them play or just wandering around the building. On the way home, he would buy an ice-cream lolly for me from Lake View Restaurant which was located just across the road from the library. (That was the main reason why I would tag along in the first place).  

The roads have become very crowded nowadays. Traffic Jams (which were unheard of just a few years ago) are a common occurrence. Imphal has also become a much more dangerous place than it used to be for other reasons as well. There has been an increase in lawlessness over the years. Cases of kidnapping of children and adults, bomb blasts, etc are quite frequent these days. Because of the prevailing environment, sending children outside the home unescorted and alone is like taking a risk. When I was his age, I and my friends would go wherever we fancied, even kilometres away from home… to play cricket or to visit schoolmates’ homes.

The games that we played were usually outdoor ones like cricket, marbles, cheitek kotpi (gilli danda), kite flying, etc. I bought my son a PSP which he plays on when there is load shedding and he cannot use his PS2 or watch TV. He is familiar with computers and surfs channels on TV like a pro. Unfortunately, the only cricket he’s familiar with is the one he plays on his videogame console.

Minutes of the proceedings of a very important meeting

It has recently come to light that the powers that be in Manipur had a meeting to discuss some very urgent and important issues confronting the smooth operation of the machinery. The said meeting, a confidential but strategically placed source confided, took place at an undisclosed and highly classified location given the sensitivity of the issues discussed and the potentially fatal combination of participants.

The meeting was participated in by representatives from all major power brokers of the state such as the Politicians, the Police, the Bureaucrats, the Thikadaars (Contractors), the Indian Military/Paramilitary, the Business Class and the ‘Freedom Fighters’ (Ima leibak gi damak katho aba kangbu).

This meeting came in the backdrop of supposed protectors of society, like policemen/army personnel getting caught carrying out some not too legal activities like trying to smuggle drugs across the border into Myanmar or politicians apparently not being too honest while declaring their educational qualifications before the elections and the Election Commission finding out about it or policemen kidnapping businessmen for ransom from the heart of the city and murdering them. Among the agenda discussed threadbare at the conference were:

1) Whether to legitimise the selling of govt. jobs so as to streamline the amount charged.

2) How much percentage to charge from bootleggers like Mr. Chandu of Thangal Bazar and the folks at 1^st and 2^nd MR for selling IMFL and how to distribute said percentage among different stakeholders.

3) How much percentage to be charged for awarding Govt. contract work taking into consideration the profit margin of the different profiting agencies.

4) The hike in prices of commodities esp. during ‘economic blockades’, again keeping in mind, the profit margin of the concerned profiting agencies like the traders, taxing authorities such as the Policemen at the check gates and the, ahem, ‘Freedom Fighters’ who levy their own taxes on the transporters.

5) How to co-ordinate the smuggling of drugs and other contraband across and from the border among the various agencies so that embarrassing incidents like the ones cited above can be avoided.

After much deliberation, it was decided that, henceforth, all vacancies in various govt. depts. will be consolidated and then sold at a standard rate from a kiosk to be opened at Babupara, Imphal. The rate for different jobs will depend on the position and ‘earning potential’. Giving in to demands from the SC/ST/OBC lobby, it was also decided to give 15% discounts to STs and 10% to OBCs. Because of the likelihood of demand exceeding supply, the jobs will be sold strictly on ‘’first come first serve basis’.

It was decided that designated bootleggers like the gentlemen mentioned above will be given due protection by the concerned authorities. Keeping in mind the welfare of the consuming public, the said gentlemen will not be allowed to hike their rates at random. Also, efforts will be made to ensure that stock do not get exhausted so that the, again, consuming public do not suffer.

In the interest of fairness, a common percentage will be charged for the award of contract work from the concerned contractor. This percentage will then be distributed among the various profiting agencies. The modalities for this distribution will be worked out by the representatives of the profiting agencies at a later meeting, the date, time and venue to be decided after this current meeting.

It was also decided that from now on, proper co-ordination will be done among the different agencies to ensure that the smuggling of drugs etc across and from the border can take place without any hiccups like the ones already mentioned above.

The meeting concluded with a vote of thanks by the senior most participant who expressed his belief that such meetings are absolutely necessary to ensure that Manipur remains firmly in their grip. He also mentioned that it was in the interest of all stakeholders to continue co-operating with one another. He thanked everyone for taking time off from their busy schedules to attend this very profitable meeting.

Disclaimer: The writer means no harm to any living, dead or undead persons or animals. Any resemblance of any of the participants of the meeting to any living person is purely coincidental.

How Mother India treats her daughters

A five year old child! How can one find a five year old child even remotely sexually attractive? It gives me the shivers…. just to think about it. I read somewhere that people who commit such heinous and unspeakable crimes are often normal seeming and not obviously psychotic as one would assume. This is a very worrying thought cos it means there are people among us … colleagues, friends, acquaintances, people we pass on the streets…. who may, if given the opportunity, turn into monsters.

My heart goes out to the little girl in Delhi who became a victim of such monsters… and who will carry the unimaginable scar of her harrowing experience for the rest of her life.

But how many other Gudiyas have been victims of such crimes in our country and how many such similar incidents go unreported? The truth is, our Indian society, in spite of all the diversities in terms of race, caste and creed, have one thing in common and that is, the way we treat our women and girls. Thousands, if not millions of girls and women, suffer various kinds of atrocities at the hands of their fathers, brothers, husbands, neighbours, classmates, teachers etc.  

Ours is a country where women are burnt for not bringing the desired dowry. In many parts of the country, women still do not have any say in who they want to marry or how they want to live their lives. Even in the big cities, women, especially those perceived as defenceless or easy prey like those from the North east, are frequently molested and raped.

Yes, there are changes. The media is taking a more proactive role in highlighting these cases. The government and its organs like the police are becoming more sensitized and are making positive noises. The people, like in the cases of Nirbhaya and Gudiya, are also taking their anger out into the streets, which is good because it shows that many of us have had enough and wish to see some changes.

However, I feel that what we need is a huge attitudinal change cutting across all classes and regions. This change should come from inside. I dream of an India where girls may form a rock band and play at concerts anywhere without inviting fatwas; an India where they can love and marry anyone regardless of caste or creed without being ‘honourably’ murdered by her own brothers or fathers.

The hallmark of a truly civilised society is the freedom and liberty granted to the members of the fairer sex. It is clearly evident that we still have a long way to go.

The Other Indians: A Perspective

What makes an Indian….. an Indian? Is it the skin colour – chocolate to light brown, or the love for spicy, masala laced food, is it the language - Sanskrit based or Dravidian, is it the nose – sharp & pointed, is it the attire – dhoti, sari, salwar kameez? If the above describes your typical Indian, what about the rest of us who don’t fit into that description? There are millions of Indians in the North East and Ladakh who are snub nosed, yellow skinned, who love eating light boiled fare and who speak languages not even related with Sanskrit or any of the Dravidian languages.

Yet you will find these Indians everywhere – in the armed forces, on the border, defending the country from its enemies; in your favourite restaurant – cooking and serving your food; in your apartment building – helping to protect your home and loved ones; in corporate offices; in call centres; in banks; in schools and colleges. Because they are so different from the typical Indian, they find it much more difficult to assimilate or as the saying goes, ‘to melt into the crowd’ unlike say, a Tamil in Delhi or a Bengali in Bangalore. Since their homelands are impoverished and do not provide ample opportunities for education, jobs or a decent life even, thousands of people from the NE have, over the years, been migrating to other states. There, many of them find jobs, get admission in good schools, colleges and universities and get to live a decent secure life. However, there’s a price that they continually pay for this privilege of living among their countrymen from the mainland and that is to be ridiculed, insulted, made fun of and generally to be made conscious of their ‘differentness’. Sometimes they are not even acknowledged as Indians but as Nepalis, Chinese, Korean, Thai … etc.  

Our country is fast on its way to becoming one among the developed countries of the world. Often, we read and hear about the enviable growth rate, the booming economy, the latest military acquisitions by the armed forces, etc. But the question is – can India really call itself developed and advanced when a large number of its racial minorities are made to feel lesser by their own countrymen.

My Brother: The flawed rebel

We were two sides of the same coin, attached yet radically different from one another. As a matter of fact, we had different tastes in almost everything, be it music, books or even clothes. We even looked very different. I idolised him though. I remember, as a child I used to have an inexplicable fear of him. Since there was a gap of 6 years between us, I was always in awe of him.

While I am essentially a conformist, he was the quintessential rebel. By the time he reached his mid teens, he had long hair and was into heavy metal. I was just a little boy then. Along with some of his friends, he even started a rock band called Hell’s Angels, presumably one of the first such in Manipur. This was in the late 1980s. I remember the constant arguments between him and my parents who, naturally, were not pleased with his lifestyle – his hair, his music, his friends, his leather jacket et al. Before all these happened, before he decided to rage against the system, my brother was apparently a very good student who would bring home good grades.

Then, as events unfolded, he got kicked out of school because he refused to cut his hair. My parents used their hard earned money to send him to Shillong where I was also studying. However, he still refused either to cut his hair or to sever his relations with his friends/ band. As a matter of fact, his band followed him to Shillong where they even gave a performance at the State Central Library (perhaps the first concert tour by a rock band from Manipur outside the state). This was in the year 1987. His all time favourite band was Iron Maiden. In fact, his stage name was Eddie, the monstrous mascot of Iron Maiden (he told this to me years later).

My parents, however, never gave up on him. Using every possible tactic, they managed to make him complete his 10+2. I think, by this time, he had also started realising the error of his ways. But his lifestyle had already taken a toll on him as he was to realise a few years later. After his 12^th, he got nominated for an engineering course at the Regional Engineering College in Patna, Bihar.  

 

It was 1996, I was in my B.A second year at Ramjas College, Delhi University. My brother had completed his B.E. I was staying with some of my friends at Mukherjee Nagar near the North Campus. In the month of October that year, he suddenly turned up in Delhi and told me that he wished to spend some time with me. I knew he had not been feeling well lately but I still had no inkling about why he would come all the way from Imphal to ‘spend time with me’.  Anyways he spent one month with me. As it turned out, it was to be the last time I was ever to see him.

I still think about that month even today. I am happy that we could spend that time together. We were able to do many of those things that we never could do before together. We went shopping, watched movies and even drank together…. He told me so many things that he never did before. He told me about his life and took a keen interest in mine. Once or twice, we spent the whole night chatting away and only went to bed after sunrise. I will always treasure that month that he gave to me.

The absolute last time that I saw him was at the New Delhi Railway Station. I dropped him till his berth. He gave me a hug and that was it. I came back to my place little knowing that I was never going to see him again.

He passed away on 17^th April 1997, exactly 16 years ago. It was in the middle of my Second Year Exams. His death changed everything. It shattered my parents and me.

Even after death, he still has a hold on me. He left me a note in his diary, telling me to take care of our parents and never to let them down. I have tried to do so. I hope, wherever he is, he’ll be satisfied. But I can’t help wondering how things might have turned out if he were still here.

Those moving pictures' promise

My love affair with TV and cinema began at a very young age. Those days... there were no DVDs or CDs. Heck, we didn't have a TV even. I remember my dad bringing home our first TV. I was in Class 1 or 2 then and it was just before the 1984 Olympics.
There were many cinema halls in Imphal then. There was Imphal Talkies, Pratap Talkies, Usha, Victory and Friends Talkies in Paona Bazar; there was Shankar Talkies in Lamphel and Asha and Jina Halls at Awang BOC. This was years before Hindi Cinema was banned and all of these cinema halls would play the latest hindi releases. I remember watching films like Akhri Raasta which had Amitabh Bachhan in a double role and Ek Dujhe Ke Liye which has Kamal Haasan and Rati Agnihotri with the entire family. Once in a while, the whole family, which included aunts, uncles and cousins would  take a trip together to one of these cinema halls to watch a movie. We were living in a joint family then with edhou and abok and there were quite a few of us living under the same roof. In the absence of TV and computers, we were all crazy about movies, particularly Hindi movies. Stars like Sunny Deol, Sanjay Dutt, Anil Kapoor, Sridevi, Madhuri Dixit etc were houldhold names. Prem Chopra, Pran and Amrish Puri were names that evoked fear among young and old alike. Of course, now and then, my parents or my brother would take me to see an English movie. I saw many of the Bruce Lee flicks like Fist of Fury and Game of Death and also the Superman movies with my brother.

Look East ...

People from the North East, particularly those with mongoloid features, have always suffered discrimination from those in the so called mainland. And if you look at the reports coming in, it's evident that it's a countrywide phenomenon and not just confined to Delhi or the North.
Of course, it would be wrong to paint everyone with the same brush. Not everyone in the mainland exhibits the same discriminatory attitude towards people from the NE. Having said that, I think we need to know the reasons why so many of us with mongoloid features from the NE go through these harrowing experiences.
I think it all has to do with the mindset of these people. Their attitude stems mostly from ignorance and their inability, reluctance or even unwillingness to treat us as fellow countrymen. The govt. is also hugely responsible for not doing anything concrete to change this mindset. A lot of Indians, even semi-educated ones don't know much about the NE or the people living here. They don''t know anything about the history of the NE, the diverse communities settled here or their rich cultures and traditions. One of the main reasons why this is so is because nothing is taught to these people about the NE either in school or college.
If you pick up any history, geography or even language textbook prescribed by NCERT, which is the main body responsible for framing the curriculum in schools in India, you will hardly find any mention of the NE and the people settled here.
This has also given rise to some pretty ironic situations. For instance, the students reading in CBSE affiliated schools located here in the NE do not learn anything about their own region whereas they are taught the history of the Rajput kingdoms or the Maratha Peshwas or Tipu Sultan or Razia Sultan. They know all about the exploits of Shivaji and Bhagat Singh and Prithviraj Chauhan but they know nothing or next to nothing about the heroes from their own region. Most students have never heard of Lachit Borphukan who defeated the mighty Mughal Army and prevented the NE from becoming a part of the Mughal Empire. They know nothing about Bir Tikendrajit or Kiang Nangbah and dozens of others who defied the mighty British and were punished with death for this defiance.
The disconnect that exists between the NE and the rest of the country is also not helped by the fact that most of us who go outside the region tend to construct ghettos of our own when we reach there. We stick to ourselves and usually don't reach out to others just as they don't reach out to us. This particular problem is compounded by the fact that we look different, we eat different, we dress different, we speak different. What I am trying to say here is simply that I think we also should make an effort to assimilate with the locals there. I mean, don't those mainlainders who come to our region to work and settle - don't they learn our languages and eat our foods... I think those of them who do fit in just fine.
The token measures taken up by the govt. whenever any crisis comes up - when a Richard Loitam is killed or when a Dana Sangma commits suicide apparently because of racial discrimination will not be enough to solve the problem, I feel. It is just too deep rooted. There's a need for much more wide ranging and drastic steps. For starters, the NCERT and other curriculum framing bodies can start including NE centric topics in the syllabi. This will make those children in places like Meerut or Bhatinda or Nasik know about us and our history/ culture and what we look like just as we know about them. The mainstream media can also do its bit by giving more coverage to NE related issues. On our part, we also need to start taking a more inclusive attitude towards them.