By – Amar Yumnam
Imphal, Aug 5:
One political economic feature has become very frequently visible in the case of Manipur. This is a state feature is confirmed by the statements heard in the legislature of Manipur in Session now. In Manipur’s Democracy, the Head of the People has been revealing two unimaginable characteristics of making inconsistent statements in the public and speaking what is he supposed not to speak in the interest of the society and the state.
Here let me repeat some commonly known qualitative features of Manipur. First, it is well known that Manipur has been in a situation needing some real endeavours for fast development; it is more so today. Second, given the natural and financial resources of the province, the role of the state in Manipur’s development is important. Third, in these circumstances the role of the Head of the People is paramount; he should be coherent and able to arouse trust among the people; the element of Trust is particularly important as the public perception of the government leaves much to be desired. Fourth, as the political-economic role is paramount, it is important that he should not only be consistent in his statements, but should as well be responsible in making statements to the public. While putting statements to the public, he should be emphasising the issue and the particular action being considered as relevant to the issue; he cannot afford round-about shouting and attention-diverting indulgence. He should be responsible by putting the announcements into action and efforts are visible for achieving the announced objectives. Fifth, while statements being put to the public should reflect consistency and responsibility, it is equally important that being the Leader of the Governance Mechanism, he should equally be aware of what things to be revealed and what things are left to be revealed by the outcomes of actions.
But unfortunately for Manipur, these happen to be the areas where she is found to be terribly wanting. Today these realities remind me of what I had read exactly ten years back– a book titled Societal Dynamics And Fragility written by Alexandre Marc and four others. While appreciating the increasing understanding of the significance of institutions (formal and informal norms, habits, cultural traditions, etc), the book emphasised: “What is less understood is exactly how the state-society relationship translates into more effective institutions. Which factors matter most in improving the quality of the relationship, such that it translates to better institutions? What types of societal dynamics can derail progress in building good institutions? No simple formula exists for improving the state-society relationship, but solid evidence indicates that building social cohesion is a critical component.” This is a very critical observation.
The importance of the state (read government with all her key functions) is paramount in the particular social realities of Manipur today for the “state influences society most directly through the distribution of resources. Through its policies of distribution, a government can favour some groups and classes over others, and that has significant ramifications for citizens’ perceptions of social justice.” Now what has happened in Manipur today is: it is as if a single individual meaning the government and the state; this individual is incoherent in his statements and bothers least whether the public trusts him or not. In such cases, there would never arise any kind of state-society interaction holding meaningful properties for social transformation. Here I recall a friend recently made a remark that the present government of Manipur sees University matters as something like the ones handled by the Flood Control Department of the government; he was making this statement while discussing the problems of the DM University in Manipur.
There is thus virtually no political-economic perspective of the Manipur government which we can perceive as the policy framework for governance and development in Manipur. Even more unfortunately, the Centre has also lost its mind on how to go about governing and developing the Manipur, and for that matter, the Northeast (I mean the Seven Sisters in India’s Northeast and not the Direction of location of China as used in the latest Economic Survey).
While ignoring the earlier periods, from around 1996 there was a strong push for making the Northeast join the development race till the time of silent but serious Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh. The High Level Commission, popularly known as the Shukla Commission put this clearly in 1997: “The Northeast tends to be seen as a distant post, some kind of land’s end. Yet it was until recently a crossroads and a bridge to Southeast and East Asia, with its great rivers ending in ocean terminals the Northeast must be enabled to grow at its own pace and in accordance with its own genius. It cannot be treated merely as a resource region, market dump and transit yard. There is a strong resentment over what is seen as an earlier phase of “colonial exploitation” in which wealth was extracted for others’ enrichment. Such a path of development is not advocated.” This was the guiding principle for evolving policies on the Northeast till the time of Manmohan Singh as the Prime Minister. But the Union Government today does not have any policy framework for the Northeast. This is coupled by the poverty of self-understanding in the region and absence of cohesion for pushing for any shared agendum. It is exactly in this environment that Manipur has a Leadership not known for coherence and commitment to socio-economic advancement at the societal level.
