Dialogue  October-December, 2006 , Volume 8 No. 2

North-East Scan


ULFA’s Subversive Politics  

Patricia Mukhim

At last Ms Mamoni Raisom Goswami has conceded defeat. She realizes the futility of nurturing a hopeless idealism. Her Ulfa boys have qualified into hard-core terrorists for whom the act of terror has become an end in itself. Latest media reports that Ulfa supremo Paresh Barua is a regular visitor to Pakistan and an honoured guest of Bangladesh, residing in the affluent environs of that country, should, hopefully, urge the simple Asomiyas to discard their blinkers about the outfit’s chimerical ideology. One was never really quite so hopeful that anything would come out of the Peoples’ Consultative Group (PCG). This body became a front which Ulfa used to the maximum to take the heat off itself, to facilitate its regrouping, following the Bhutan offensive. Hence the PCG’s denouement was inevitable.    
        What is surprising is that Asomiya civil society never once questioned the legitimacy of the PCG, being constituted as it was by the Ulfa. A body trying to negotiate peace should have comprised an independent body of citizens with a track record of credibility and  equidistance from both Ulfa and the State. The PCG was by definition a misnomer because it did not have the courage of conviction to publicly denounce the Ulfa’s acts of terror. On the contrary, each time there was an alleged security over-drive, the PCG was, perhaps, directed by the outfit to publicly condemn the excesses. This was all too apparent. Terrorist groups have always tried to arm-twist civil society organizations. So the PCG too must have been arm-twisted, times without number, to say it the Ulfa way. In the absence of any dissent about the function of the PCG, the body assumed a role bigger than itself. This role was that of an Ulfa advocate, defending its stance and riling at the Government, the security forces and the state police, but never once reproachful of their client despite the outfit’s repeated attacks on defenseless citizens.  
        Except for the Dhemaji misadventure, where Asomiyas lost their lives, and where, predictably the Asomiya civil society raised a banner of protest, in recent times the Ulfa targets have been largely non-Asomiyas. Bihari labourers and other Indians, children included, have been mercilessly blown to smithereens. Naturally these citizens are now living in a state of paranoia because the Gogoi government has admittedly failed to contain terror. A migration of Bihari labourers to safer zones is predicted. But in a booming economy, infrastructure creation does require its crop of manual labourers. Who will replace the Biharis?              Your guess is as good as mine. More Bangladeshi labourers will cross over to feed the humungous construction and hospitality industries that have become the sin-qua-non of Guwahati. And while the very articulate and ostensibly deeply offended Asomiyas rant and rave about influx or illegal migration, and, arm-chair intellectuals cite their own statistics about the number of immigrants present and voting in the State, the Ulfa will continue to create the space for their rightful existence. It’s the least that Paresh Barua and his associates can do to pay back for the hospitality they enjoy in Bangladesh. One even wonders whether Asom still features in their mental and emotional radar as their homeland. Does one bleed his homeland so brutally and relentlessly both in terms of blood spilt and money extorted?  
            Struggles for self-determination across the globe are defined by the active involvement of common people who believe in the cause. As long as the movement is guided by voices from the ground it usually moves on the right track. In such cases there is usually no need to impose any taxes on citizens. They will themselves pledge their financial, moral and emotional support. Such support can only be equated to that of citizens cheering their soldiers when the country is at war. Analyze the Ulfa struggle. Self-determination  preponderates their agenda. Has the outfit ever sought the wise counsel of Asomiya  people, leave alone intellectuals who could give a sense of direction to the movement? We may be critical of the Naga cause but the fact remains that it does carry some semblance of peoples’ participation. Whatever be the impediments to the Naga talks, the ideologues are very clear in their minds that they need to carry the people along in order to ensure their constant support and also to legitimize their own actions, for the greater mission of achieving Naga sovereignty. Has Ulfa ever indicated that it needs the mandate of the Asomiya people and the reiteration of that mandate every now and again?  
        Things are going horribly wrong in Asom today. Non-Asomiyas have been threatened with a tax for living and working in the State. Since greed is not known to have a ceiling it is only a matter of time before Asomiyas too will be taxed. You do not need too much grey matter to figure this out. Such arbitrary acts have been amply demonstrated by the militants of Meghalaya who began their tryst with terror by first fleecing non-tribals. Until then the tribes remained happily unconcerned. It was only when Khasis and Garos became targets that dissent too became more palpable. This selective, selfish reaction extracts a heavy price. We are a pluralistic, multi-cultural society. Remaining silent when some members of that society are bled is a crime. One is therefore intrigued by the stunning silence of the Asomiyas regarding the Ulfa diktat to non-Asomiyas. This forces the assumption that Asomiya civil society has a sort of incestuous, inexplicable relationship with the Ulfa which compel it to remain insouciant despite clear signals that ultimately they will themselves become targets.   
        It is time for the people of Asom to come to grips with reality. If terror grips the state there is little that security forces can do to help. They are as vulnerable to bombs and bullets as the man on the street is. The unfortunate part is that state violence will only heighten with the upsurge of Ulfa attacks on civilian targets. Since state forces will be shooting in the dark their bullets will obviously hit unintended targets. This will be followed by public recriminations. That is exactly what the Ulfa loves. The vicious cycle of terror, intimidation and extortion will continue. Now that Ulfa is allegedly employing Bangladeshi youth to throw bombs and grenades at selected targets, whatever illusions the Asomiyas had about their nationalistic heroes should actually dissipate. With  growing evidence that Ulfa is also creating space for ‘jehadis’ of all shades to carry out their subversive activities in Asom, one can only imagine what a deadly ritual in blood this will turn out to be.   
        A silent, complacent civil society is an undefined enemy of peace. If terror has survived so long it is public apathy that allowed its survival. Intermittent protests when a bomb blast kills a few people do not actually constitute an intelligent civil society response. Complacency, they say is the devil’s drug. It produces fatty degeneration of a people.  
        What has exacerbated the problems in Asom is a faltering and out-of-form political leadership whose incompetence is an established fact. Asom needs a new breed of political leaders who have their own grass-roots following and the dynamism to provide governance. Obviously such young leadership will not need to use insurgents to garner votes for them and thereafter remain obliged to allow free operating space. The reigning politicians have all done their tango with the outfit. The saddest thing that could have happened to Asom is that the incompetent, bumbling leadership was given a second tenure due to complete bankruptcy of political leadership in the State. What more can one say when civilized assertions are totally absent. Government of India is not the villain of the piece. Silence and apathy are.   

Augmenting a Terrorist Economy

         Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh landed at Imphal amidst a visible public protest, convened by the Apunba Lup, a conglomerate of 32 organisations protesting the imposition of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) in Manipur. Singh’s visit obviously has twin objectives. First, it is a confidence building exercise for a flagging Congress party in Manipur, scheduled to go to the assembly polls early next year. Second, it was an open demonstration of the Prime Minister’s disquiet about the draconian AFSPA, which is a thorn in the flesh of those people in whose living spaces the Act is enforced and a veritable conundrum for Delhi. Following Irom Sharmila’s shift to the national capital, the emaciated lady with an iron will has attracted national and international attention. The UDA Government was forced to do something. Hence Dr Manmohan Singh’s Manipur visit.  
        Justice Jeevan Reddy and his team had conducted a thorough enquiry on the adverse effects of the AFSPA. That the Act violates the human rights of civilians in a conflict zone was not lost on the Committee. Since the Reddy Report has not been tabled in parliament, one is not privy to the recommendations. But sources claim that Justice Reddy and his team have recommended that the Act be revoked. The Prime Minister, on the other hand, has assured the people of Manipur that the Act would be toned down and ‘made more humane’. One would like to put this question to the good doctor. How can an Act, that was cleverly crafted by an imperialist power for quashing any uprising, now be used by the State against it own people. And to think that the Act has been used so unrelentingly and aggressively shows blatant disregard for human rights as enshrined in the Constitution. Is the Indian State so lacking in creativity that it cannot think beyond a colonial Act to tackle militancy in the region?  
        Manipur is replete with ironies. Its people, as I have repeatedly maintained, are highly cultured, intellectually brilliant and extremely versatile in the field of performing arts and sports. Many of them fill and feed the academic spaces of universities in Delhi and other portals of learning in this country. Recently, a police officer from Manipur, Soibam Ibocha Singh, a veteran in counter-insurgency operations was reported to have adapted concepts from the Royal Ulster Constabulary of North Ireland and policing methods of Japan and Singapore, to introduce a two tier system of policing in Manipur. As a result of this acquired education, Ibocha Singh was able to ensure least collateral damage during the two month-long agitation against the AFSPA. Sigh was conferred a PhD for his thesis on community policing.  
        Rattan Thiyam the doyen of Manipuri theatre was conferred the Sukhapha award by Assam Chief Minister, Tarun Gogoi on the occasion of Asom Divas. Thiyam has left his imprint not just in Manipur but is an acknowledged dramatist in the national and international arena. Manipuri dance is known for its expressive narration of poignant tales but also for its remarkably colourful and unique costume, which is one of a kind. Yet this dynamic population has also procreated the most virulent form of militancy which has all but paralysed the democratic process and resulted in the complete break down of governance. The spiraling violence and extortion has compelled a weak-kneed State to adopt extraordinary measures such as the use of the army and para-military forces in large numbers. Needless to say this has created a deadly cocktail.  
        While Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh was touring Manipur, and promising more financial sops to the State, Manipuri intellectuals like Bhagat Oinam and Bimol Akoijam were arguing the wisdom of pushing in more funds into Manipur when the State was in no position to utilize those funds in a transparent manner. They stated their points at an international seminar titled Armed Conflict, Development and Governance which was going on at Shillong the very same day. It is no secret that a good chunk of development funds go the coffers of sundry militant outfits, particularly the more notorious ones. A weak state is least capable of putting the funds to good use. But Delhi in its ignorance of ground realities, repeats these mistakes and compounds the problems.  
        Over the years, several crores of rupees have been cornered by militant organisations in Manipur, Nagaland and Assam. This peculiar phenomenon has led Ajai Sahni, a counter-insurgency expert to coin the phrase “terrorist economy”. This terrorist economy naturally causes further attrition to the state economy. Development is stunted and the state’s gross domestic product sinks lower and lower. Law and order further deteriorates as fringe elements take advantage of the culture of extortion. Disillusioned, unemployed youth take to militancy as a fish takes to water. Much of the extorted money goes towards purchase of more sophisticated arms and ammunition that are used against the state and its citizens.
        One of the papers presented at the Shillong seminar suggested that one way of tackling extortion, which has become a flourishing industry in the North East, is to decentralize governance. The more centralized the economy the easier it is for insurgents to blackmail those who administer the funds. If truth be spoken then extortion is not purely a terrorist activity. In states like Manipur there is overt and covert collusion between insurgents, politicians and government officials. Without this cohort the outfits would not be in a position to find out how much money a particular department is allocated. And if one is to look at the neat percentages worked out for payment to insurgents then it needs no further elaboration to know who does the calculation and book keeping for the outfits. Of course, the excuse used by all government officials is “we have to comply otherwise we will be shot”. Its an easy way out and a profitable one too for many. 
        So how does decentralisation happen? Economist, Dipankar Sengupta, suggests that Panchayati Raj should be implemented in letter and spirit. This, is in fact the only solution to the conundrum in India’s North East. The reason why development was stalled is because village-level institutions were allowed to atrophy. After the Constitution was adopted in 1950, a select group of people became the rulers. They did not believe in the wisdom and ingenuity of the people in villages and mohallas. They did all the planning and prepared schemes that were not in consonance with the needs of people. Implementation of those schemes was skewed and corruption ensured that the money was creamed off before it could reach the so-called targeted beneficiaries. A vicious nexus of contractors, politicians and bureaucrats developed not only in the states but at the Centre as well.  
        To counter insurgency effectively Sengupta suggests that the process needs to be reversed. The 73rd and 74th Amendment Acts need to be implemented in right earnest. These Acts are designed to bring in greater transparency because development plans are crafted by people themselves. They know the budget for each scheme. If they are to implement the schemes, militants would find it difficult to demand money from the village institutions.  Since militants themselves deride governments for lack of development, they would have no excuse to strangle the development process further by demanding a cut out of development funds. And if they did so they would lose the oxygen of public support. 
        Government of India has proved beyond a reasonable doubt that India’s North East is  good for occasional engagements but not worth giving a serious thought to. This region must find its own answers to its assorted problems. But can politicians and bureaucrats do that? Civil society must rise to the occasion.  

Intellectualising  Crime

        Mohammed Afzal Guru was sentenced to death by no less an institution than the apex court of this country. Death penalty, the argument goes, is given for the rarest of rare cases. Afzal was accused and convicted for the attack on parliament in December 2001. That strike proved fatal for a CRPF jawan on duty. She fought desperately to prevent the attackers from getting inside and also alerted her colleagues. Her body became an easy  target and she died in action leaving behind her adolescent children and husband. Mohammed Afzal, a terrorist of the Jaish-e-Mohammed group was the brain behind the attack. He unabashedly confessed to attacking the heart of India’s democratic institution – the Indian Parliament.  
        Afzal was to have been hanged on October 20 but a mercy petition from his wife and father, to the President, has deferred the execution of the death sentence. The intellectual class led by Arundhati Roy have also petitioned the President saying that Afzal did not receive a fair trial according to the norms of international legal jurisprudence. In a country that calls itself secular, yet, is so divided and polarized along religious lines, even crime is tinged with religious overtones. Chief Minister of Kashmir, Ghulam Nabi Azad in true political bravado pleaded on behalf of the convict saying that the date of his hanging should be postponed as it coincides with Jumat-ul-Vida (the last Friday of the month of Ramzan). 
        The political class is clearly divided on this issue. While some in the Congress seem inclined towards appeasement, there are hardliners who feel the sentence should be executed because, they argue, that if the militants had their way there is no knowing how many high profile casualties there would have been on that fateful day. The BJP position is, of course, predictable. Being in the opposition they have the opportunity to crucify the Congress for soft-pedaling on terrorism and giving India the bad name of a ‘soft state. A section of politicians and intellectuals are worried that the execution of the death sentence would further alienate the Kashmiris. Noted jurist, Soli Sorabjee in one of his articles on the issue said that the argument is nothing short of blackmail. At least the nuances to that effect are very clear.  
        What bearing does the Afzal Mohammed case have on India’s North East? Sanjoy Ghosh, a committed development worker was brutally murdered, allegedly on orders from the ULFA top brass. His aunt, Arundhati Ghosh, a career diplomat with the United Nations had petitioned the international community that the ULFA leaders be tried for murder. Sanjoy Ghosh’s killers are still at large. But suppose there is a public outcry as there has been in the Priyadarshini Mattoo, Jessica Lall and Nitish Kataria cases and the Sanjoy Ghosh case is reopened and investigation is  speeded up leading to conviction of the murderer, would enlightened civil society appeal for mercy for the killer? 
        Militancy in this region is often given the euphemism of a freedom struggle. Secessionist movements are legitimized because of the circuitous route adopted by the architects of India’s nationhood. But wars of secessionism should be clearly differentiated from organised crime. In the former, the non-state militia target security or state forces. In the latter the targets are defenceless civilians. Militants attack civilians to create terror or because they do not comply to extortion demands. Organised attacks on civilians which result in death or lifelong disabilities are criminal acts. Those who cause such deaths and disabilities must be tried by the law of the land. Unfortunately, in an effort to buy peace at all costs, the state tends to undermine the crimes of militants/terrorists. Those who surrender not only get general amnesty but also get a financial package to make a fresh start. This leniency has in fact given a boost to militancy.
        KPS Gill the man who quashed militancy in the Punjab in the way his police instincts knew best, termed the terrorists as ‘knights of falsehood’. Few would differ with KPS Gill’s definition. Militants thrive on falsehood and propaganda. They compel helpless civilians to organise protests against what is termed as ‘human rights abuses by security forces’, and to shoot out press statements to that effect. But militants believe they have the license to kill so the abuses they commit are justified. Recently ULFA threw a bomb at a puja pandal in Dhemaji. One young boy was killed and several others were injured. Earlier the outfit threw a bomb at an Independence day celebration and killed thirteen people, also at Dhemaji. What do we term such senseless killing of innocent people? Are they not human rights abuses? These double standards that intellectuals and civil society adopt actually erode the very foundations of the rule of law. These are, in fact, clear signs of a soft state that is unable to distinguish between ordinary criminals and militants fighting a cause.
        If we assess the Peoples’ Consultative Group (PCG) of Asom which is currently facilitating peace talks between ULFA and Government of India, and which claims to represent civil society, we see a group of individuals who are hand-picked by the ULFA. They cannot therefore be non-partisan stand. This group is engaged in what scholar of conflict term as confidence mediation. Confidence mediators are expected to be impartial and to remain equi-distant from the parties in conflict. Yet the PCG is closer to the ULFA and are always on the defensive about the outfit’s offensive. But a counter strike by the security forces is magnified and becomes a sore point with them. One question that the PCG ought to answer is whether they expect the state to stand by and watch while the ULFA strengthens its extortion network and kills mercilessly. What is the price that the state is expected to pay to buy peace from the ULFA? And are we sure that the ULFA wants peace and not just a time to regroup and revitalize? How can the state take an outfit seriously when its leaders are still playing truant and apparently unwilling to bear the cost of a peace talk.
        There is an element of dubiousness when leaders of militant outfits choose to lives of affluence in foreign countries of their choice. True freedom fighters like Gandhi and Nelson Mandela preferred to live in jail and enthuse their followers from within the prison walls. These are leaders worthy of emulation. Their actions put the state in a quandary because any act of cruelty towards them would immediately draw world attention. One of the reasons why the Naga talks have become so oblique and tortuous is  because the leaders are unwilling to pay the price required of them. Leaders who do not know the meaning of ‘sacrifice’ cannot accuse others of duplicity or lack of seriousness. Freedom fighters lead from the front. They do not bark orders from the safety of their hideouts.
        What one fails to understand is the mind of the civil society and the intellectuals in the insurgency ridden states and also of free-thinking, freelancing intellectuals and so-called human rights activists who jump to support a cause without going deeper into the ramifications of their actions. I find it even more unacceptable when militants demand the upholding of human rights. Every pre-meditated act that results in harm and injury and cause death and destruction is a crime. Armed combatants cannot kill unarmed civilians to achieve their objectives. There is no international law to support such acts of brutality. If there is a clemency plea for one there must be a clemency plea for all. These arbitrary protests reek of intellectual dishonesty because they tend to pick and choose who they wish to defend, depending upon the profile of the criminal.
        There is no doubt at all that capital punishment is out of character with an enlightened state and society. Those who firmly believe that capital punishment must be repealed and be replaced by life imprisonment should seek public support and push for abolition of that law. Ironically the American courts did not pass a death sentence on Zacharias Massoued the main conspirator behind the 9/11 attacks. While Massoued himself demanded a death sentence, the prosecution argued in favour of life imprisonment because, they said, a death sentence would only turn Massoued into a martyr. This should teach us a lesson or two in jurisprudence. 


Manipur: Containing a Chain Reaction  

Pradip Phanjoubam

It is amazing how an iconic image can influence decisions not just at the individual level, but at community and governmental levels. The advertising world will know better influencing companies to pump in billion of dollars in the effort to create such images for their products. Indeed much of the world of advertising is about promoting an illusory world of these iconic images to whet the worldly appetites of consumers and simply make them continue buying compulsively. And it succeeds, that is why the phenomenon not only has remained, but grown. Like it or not, who is anybody to argue with success.  
        But the iconic image business is not always a success especially when it strays out of the confines of the consumer market. In politics especially it has proven to be a flop far too often. A very immediate example is available in the northeast. The current philosophy of the counter insurgency policy of the Government of India for instance is built on a single, widely circulated iconic idea: “The Mother of All Insurgencies” in the northeast. Anybody who has been following the affairs of the region close enough will understand who this supposed “mother” is, although many of the numerous insurgencies will disagree if at all they consider this so called “mother” as their “mother”.  
        It is uncertain where the idea may have had its genesis, but probably it was a phrase coined by some journalist struck by a flash of bright idea to colour up his copy of the day. The image however has struck a chord in popular imagination and has been somewhat immortalized. Hence, the National Socialist Council of Nagaland led by Isak Swu and Thuingaleng Muivah, NSCN(IM) is supposed to be the soul of all insurgencies in the northeast. Without doubt, this perception has also influenced profoundly, government policies on insurgency. The understandable approach has been to tackle the mother in the hope that all its supposed offsprings would come under control. We also know today how badly this approach has misfired. At this moment, it is practically impossible to say which is the mother and which the child in the complex matrix of northeast insurgencies. Considering the endless complications the approach has led to, all concern would have also realized that tackling the “mother” is hardly the key to a final answer to insurgency in the region and that insurgency in the northeast as such can hardly be accommodated in a linear narrative.  
        The 1990s in Manipur was very interesting in this regard. The chain reaction in the multiplication of insurgencies amongst the Kukis, to say the least, was phenomenal. It began with the Naga-Kuki clashes that began sometime in 1992, but came to a flashpoint in 1993. This conflict, as all are aware, left over a thousand dead and many more destituted and homeless. Unlike the Nagas, who had 50 years of militancy behind them at the time, insurgency amongst the Kukis at that time was nascent and marginal, and if it did have a cognizable presence, it was the Kuki National Army, KNA in the Moreh area but mostly along the Burmese side of the international border.  
        But the clashes, in which the Kukis bore the major brunt, exposed the Kuki community’s vulnerability and it was this insecurity that became the fertile ground for the spawning of various armed militia amongst the community. This process was catalysed by the virtual absence of any effective state intervention, or its impotence in instilling any sense of confidence amongst the victimized community. The second half of the 1990s hence saw an explosion in the number of Kuki militant outfits, among them the Kuki National Front, KNF, Kuki Revolutionary Army, KRA, Kuki Liberation Army, KLA etc. Many of these organisations, did not have a strong central authority as evident in their subsequent split into numerous factions complicating matter. In a way this is understandable considering the immediate reasons for their coming into existence in the first place.  
        If this was the reason for the sudden growth and proliferation of Kuki militancy in the mid-1990s, this phenomenon in turn left other smaller kin communities of the Kukis, the Paites, Hmars etc insecure. To resist Kuki hegemony, they began making friends with the adversaries of the Kukis, the NSCN(IM) in particular, angering the latter. The bloody fratricidal Kuki-Paite clashes in the Churachandpur district even as the Kuki-Naga feuds subsided will have to be explained as a part of this vicious chain. It is also noteworthy that the feud became publicly evident after the killing of two NSCN(IM) cadres in a Paite village by Kuki militants. The feud also became the cause for the formation of Paite and other smaller tribes to form their own militant groups like the Zomi Revolutionary Army, ZRA, and Hmar People’s Convention, HPC etc.  
        But regardless of the initial push, there can be no dispute that each link of this chain has also now become a separate reality not to be taken for granted at all. But this is just one chain to demonstrate how such a chain works. There are plenty more. The interesting thing is, once formed, no part of a chain is any longer the “mother” to the other parts anymore and they become all the same. There is also no other way than to treat the whole chain as one entity. In the insurgency scenario in Manipur today for instance, it would be unrealistic to have cessation of hostility with one group and expect peace to set in, just as it would be equally unrealistic to ask only one group to disarm while the rest remain armed.  

AFSPA Debate Stagnating

       Meanwhile chief minister, Okram Ibobi Singh has found an election campaign point to gamble on. He has decided to talk tough and throw the ball back to the militants in the debate over the issue of repealing the Armed Forces Special Power’ Act, AFSPA. 
        He has been actually swimming against the tide, amidst protests for the complete removal of the Act, saying time and again that “extraordinary situations demand extraordinary measures” and the AFSPA will stay so long as the extraordinary situation created by secessionist militancy remains. 
        In his latest campaign speech in Thoubal, he appealed to the militants declare a ceasefire with the government so as to facilitate the repeal of the AFSPA from the state.  
        There is plenty to ponder on in the chief minister’s challenge. However, if the AFSPA can be explained within the stimulus-response matrix, the state is at a juncture where the very prospect of identifying what should constitute the stimulus and what the response has become blurred and confused.
        The familiar and frustrating chicken and egg story is being replayed yet again. In this vicious cycle, the State’s view is that the AFSPA is a response to violent challenges to it and its authority.  
        Those on the other side of the fence have been claiming just the opposite – that it is the draconian Act and the excesses committed under it which have spawned and hardened the violence that the AFSPA is supposed to be countering.  
        In all likelihood, the honest answer is somewhere in between. The only problem is, how honest has anybody been in trying to address the matter. And until this honesty shows up in strength, the AFSPA issue cannot possibly progress much beyond the status of a hot debate in which the State and civil activists are pitted against each other, accusing each other of tyranny and treason.  
        As one sees it, the real issue is not just about the repeal of the AFSPA, but of de-legitimizing violence. If the stimulus-response matrix were to be taken for granted, the question remains whether, if the perceived stimulus were to be removed, would what is perceived as the response disappear too?
        In many ways, the question that the chief minister has been posing is precisely this. If the AFSPA were to be removed today without a replacement, would the violence in the state end? The answer is anybody’s guess, and the chief minister is hitting at what he presumes is the obvious answer. We may not like it, and even differ, but from the State’s point of view, this is a very legitimate question.
        The argument in the reverse may not be totally applicable. That is to say, as from the State-ist viewpoint, which Ibobi spelled out, if the non-State violence were to be treated as the stimulus and if this stimulus were to be removed, would the State’s draconian responses disappear too? It probably would.
        But this is no argument, for this would amount to asking everybody to accept unquestioningly the hegemony of the State – which can be crudely translated to mean, “if you behave you will not be punished”. 
        Insurgency unfortunately, in its cause as well as its manifestation, is not as simple, for it is precisely about challenging the perceived structural inconsistencies of the State itself.  
        But there are much more sublimated ways of posing these challenges and also of accepting them. And because of the sublimation, they often prove to be more effective problem solving mechanisms.
        The minute the challengers as well as the challenged begin seeing there are such possibilities to be explored, the conflicts which have generated all the violence would have entered a new phase.
        The Naga peace talks, the ULFA peace overtures, even if it was an aborted one, and the plebiscite offer by the UNLF, can in this way be treated as signs of a thaw in attitude, and that these parties are beginning to see the possibilities of different approaches to reach an honourable solution. 
        Quite obviously there would be the necessity of plenty of give and take from all the parties not just vis-à-vis the State, but also in resolving differences between themselves. And these routes to a resolution, unlike the tame surrenders that the State has been trying to induce either through force or through statutory incentives, are not in any way “surrenders” but victories in which nobody is the loser.  

War by Other Means

    The debate over who or what should constitute the rather ethereal notion of “civil society” gets all the more intriguing in a conflict situation, such as in Manipur. The question is, should “civil society” have a technical definition and be treated as constituting of the occupants of a space earmarked between the State and private vested interests, or other power players, such as the militant challengers to the State’s authority and legitimacy?  
        While this definition of “civil society” is definitely not sufficient, it has been indeed a convenient one. The trouble however is, when there is a technical definition of “civil society”, it invariably turns into a hotly contested space, and in fact often readily transforms into an extension of the conflicts they are supposed to be arbitrating thus becoming in the process a part of the same “war by other means”.  
        Manipur is familiar with this phenomenon. The “civil society” space has been deeply fissured on sectarian ethnic lines, demonstrations of which are never in short supply. Such wars by other means are fought on practically every issue involving any two or more communities of the state’s multitude of communities. The division is also seen along other broader lines such as between the hill districts and valley districts, between the tribals and non-tribals etc.  
        It is not uncommon to even hear of self proclaimed human rights organisations, thrown up by mutually antagonistic ethnic communities, speaking two different languages on the same issue. It is as if there is nothing universal about even human rights. How then can the “civil society” be the agent for the much hyped problem solving discourses, is a question much ignored.  
        The technical ear-marking of a so called “civil society” space leads to another familiar problematic situation. The conflicting parties themselves begin actually to contest for this space by putting up their “civil society” proxies, having realized how powerful these bodies can be in force multiplying their agenda through precisely the “wars by other means”. 
        The result is a complication of the conflicts themselves. So much has already been written about how even students’ movements have become organs of those behind these conflicts. Some even float their own “civil society” bodies. Must this not be considered a corruption of the popular understanding of “civil society”? A rethink is vital to consider if the definition of civil society must not have some qualitative elements over and above just the quantitative.  

Withering State

    A weak State has not helped matter one bit either. Here, legitimate powers that should vest only with it often get wrested away by numerous “civil society” bodies, adding to the general residue of insecurity amongst a larger section of the society. Take the case of Manipur again, where the problem of a weak State is further accentuated currently by the prospect of an approaching election, scheduled sometime in early 2007.  
        For the moment at least, no decision or action, regardless of whether they are good for the state and its people in the long term, if they belong to the category that cannot be easily and immediately translated into electoral gains, can be expected. 
        Although in a different context, and lacking half the gravity of the powerfully communicated despair in Macbeth’s last word for his queen at the news of her death, in considering Manipur politics, one is reminded of how the great Shakespearean character summarised his wife’s life, “….a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
        But beyond the elections, there are many issues of extreme urgency awaiting government attention. Law and order without dispute would rank as number one among all of these. One is not simply referring to the obvious case of insurgency but also to the manner in which a major portion of what should have remained as sole governmental responsi-bility, as well as the seal of authority that should have been exclusively the government’s, are being allowed to be wrested away systematically by non-governmental players in the state’s sordid power game.
        Or are we witnessing a cruel parody of what Karl Marx called the “withering away of the state”, to give way to a “dictatorship of the proletariat”. The presumption seemed to have been, when the masses are the dictators over their own affairs, rooms for injustice and oppression would be automatically eliminated. The lessons of the atrocities of the French Revolution, which too had justice and equality as its slogans, were surprisingly missed, and VI Lenin’s interpretation of Marxism took cognizance of this problematic area when he stressed on the centrality of the Party of elite thinkers and leaders in any Communist revolution.  
        In a way he anticipated a basic foundation of modern electoral democracy too, for indeed, democracy is also about a people electing its elite leadership to be in charge of their affairs till so long as they enjoy their confidence as expressed in their periodically renewed electoral mandates. In this way the quality of a democracy is also determined by the capability of an electorate to choose the best amongst its elite. You get the elite you deserve.  
        In Manipur, the state is withering away, not by any grand Marxian design, but precisely for the abject lack of a will or imagination to come up with a design. For our elected elite, the needs for accountability or good governance are secondary to their personal agenda centred around the competition for the spoils and clout of office.  
        A rule of the masses has thereby been unleashed, leading to a mad contest for the powers of governance amongst various “civil society” organisations. Today many of these mushrooming power centres have naturally filled in where the government is absent and have even assumed the judicial powers of summons, inquisitions and trials, executive powers of levying taxes, excise duties and even to mete out summary punishments.
        They legislate too through diktats and decrees. And yet the government continues to pretend there is nothing seriously wrong and that the law and order situation has improved.