By – Amar Yumnam
Imphal, August 18:
Let me start with some very blunt statements. This is not the way policies, actions and any other accompanying tasks should be conducted in any Democracy and in any Federal Country. Let me also be emphatic in making these statements that it is not a case of an uneducated or politically ambitious or an Indian style bureaucratic person putting statements to the public for photographs to appear in the digital and news dailies the following day. The statements follow: (A)It has been for more than two years that a large size of population and families have been in Relief Camps; the term Relief Camp necessarily implies a short period arrangement before transition or return to permanent places. But in the case of Manipur these have been converted into places for “expression of mercy” by persons with some ambitions political or otherwise and get the events reported in the news media. Further, for the government, these have been nothing more than an opportunity to make statements for early solution of causal issues such that the people (I do include children in using this term)can return early to their original places; during this period of “transition” there will be no social policy accompanying the statements. (B)By now, we all have been witness to so-called studies on India on various types of issues. But in all of these, the Northeast would just be left out without even mentioning once but conclusions would be made as of India as a whole; I am making this statement with full knowledge of understanding and definitely not as allegations. These approaches imply that the various talks of diversity and appreciation of the diverse elements while thinking on policy for India do not include the Northeast in both mind and practice. The so-called unity in diversity approach is for the regions beyond the Northeast. The “interesting” dimension of this approach has a historical trajectory. During the 1960s and 1970s and till about the mid-1980s, Assam (as the only one from the Northeast) was included in these studies and policy discussions, but today even Assam is left out. So the entire Northeast is now an abandoned part in thinking about academically or administratively for policy about India. (C)Given this background, the smallness of the region – demographic as well as geography – is assumed as absence of diversity and non-possessiveness of differential contextual reasons for specific analyses as distinguished from the rest of India. (D)We all know about the bureaucratic training, the bureaucratic approach to actions and above all the bureaucratic mind for application of mind and decision-making. These are as good as they are and as deficient as these are in cohesiveness and perspectives for policy action. But the Northeast, despite the absence of appreciation of the differential social and territorial characteristics, is a target for implementation of policies as they feel like.
Manipur today – by the way Manipur is a State in the Northeast – fundamentally and inevitably needs a Social Policy. I use a Singular Term for today the earlier approaches of divisional routes – Economic Policy, Education Policy, Health Policy, Infrastructure Policy, etc. – are no longer norms for study, research and policy formulation for the Public. Further, in a very radical way, policies today are examined about their Ethicality and Justice before being implemented. Besides the impossibility to have a peaceful mind, we all know that Manipur today does not even have roads in the real sense of the term. In this way, the weakness in any sector is being increasingly coupled by the collapse in other sectors.
While the immediacy of bringing to normal life the people in the Relief Camps within a limited period of three months or less cannot be overemphasised, we must assert the government (the federal powers in particular) must be alive to the role in deciding on the responsibilities in urgent assessment of the areas needing intervention with performance and the guiding rules. Further, the financing patterns should be fulfilled sooner than later. Still further, the institutional and the regulating dimensions should be spelt out in clear terms. In short, the government cannot afford to fail in the “efforts to enhance employment, income, wealth, and/or opportunity within a defined geographic area.” The social sector development deficiencies should be clearly identified and a limited time frame must be spelt out in no uncertain terms.
Now the brain-drain, consequent upon the social crisis, Manipur is suffering from needs earlier addressal than it would otherwise be in other areas of the country; this arises naturally from the domestic and the international implications of the location. The usual view of government as an issue in ‘politics’ should necessarily be replaced by concerns with the issue of “policy”. The governance lapses – necessarily meaning the absence of a government with a thinking mind – Manipur is fast moving towards a non-traditional inequality and a dangerous deterioration of the historically rich social culture. Both of these would have long-term negative implications for not only Manipur but for the Northeast as well; I would not talk of India.
Coming to the conclusion, Manipur government should go for the critical contextual policy perspective and implement the components sooner than later. The sharing role issues of governments in a federal democracy cannot be a reason for delay. I am afraid if the bureaucracy alone would be able to face the capability needs of such an approach. It would be in the wise of things to have sooner a Team of Advisors of five or so persons who are conversant with the geographic and the social institutional dimensions of contextual development. In this the financial commitment of the federal authority to meet the inevitable needs should be a given one.
