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The Manipuri Nation - IV
By Waikhom Damodar Singh
The golden chapter of thousands years old sovereignty and the separate identity of Manipur as an independent country, for the sake of which so many of her heroic forefathers had laid down their most precious lives, ended abruptly for November 21, 1949 onwards as the State was merged with India under compulsion for which the leaders of the then Manipur State Congress Party were instrumental for the acceleration of the process, demolishing not only the Pakhangba's 'gaddi' but also the people's rightful elected Government.
In fact, the surrender by Maharaja Bodhachandra Singh in Shillong in his royal residence at Red Lands in September, 1949 had many to weep helplessly, particularly so when they came to learn that he flatly refused initially to sign the Merger Agreement though he did finally as he had to do it under great pressure and threat directed from Delhi by putting up his strong and very reasonable argument that:
"Now that the sovereignty of the State has been vested in the people it would be in the fitness of things to hear the people's voice and learn their sentiment so that the line of action may not in any case of unconstitutional: In light of the above it may not be wrong to say that since Maharaja Bodhachandra Singh was only a nominal head of the State at that time, the Merger Agreement signed by him under threat should be actually regarded or treated as an act purely unconstitutional and bearing no authority democratically.
It is really lamentable that in the process of the merger that had been carried out so hurriedly and hastily the State of Manipur, an erstwhile independent kingdom for ages had been simply reduced to a State of a very mere status (part C) soon followed by the great 'loss' of a large chunk of her 'age-old' territorial area of Kabo valley whereas a mere district having an area less than 6000 sq miles viz, the Naga Hills district of Assam was all of a sudden upgraded to a full-fledged State with quite a good gain in its territorial area annexed from Assam (Dimapur area) and Arunachal (Tuensang area of the erstwhile NEFA), and most probably to gain much more in the 'near future' by annexing forcibly, this time, from Manipur, Assam and Arunachal - what a pity! An ill-fated destiny of the people of Manipur, in particular?
Anyway, luckily enough, the 'cohesive-force' that has been existing amongst the Tammis and all the Chingmis of heterogeneous elements of Manipur from time immemorial ever binding them under a 'spirit and love' of being one people as have been originated from a common ancestor with a common language to understand the feelings and sentiments of one another is still strong enough to resist any flagrant move to 'disintegrate and dismember' them, particularly at this hour when their social-intercourse has been freely revived irrespective of any sectional i.e. clan, caste, creed and religious diversities that are there inherently.
Actually, the appellation 'Nagas' should be construed to mean only the people, the indigenous tribes of Nagaland like the Bengalis, Assamese, Manipuris etc. does not for referring to the people of Bengal, Assam, Manipur etc. respectively, and therefore, the practice that some indigenous tribes of Manipur, Assam and Arunachal are being called Nagas should be treated now as a thing really very vague and highly ambiguous.
In this regard it may be quite pertinent to mention the strong feelings that have been expressed by one Kunghalu Mulatonu, the Deputy Kilonser (Minister), information and publicity of the NSCN (K) as was published in the North-East special column of the daily Telegraph paper on July 5, 2002. The short publication begins with the heading 'NSCN-K seeks tribe expulsion' - The National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Khaplang) has said the on-going move to unite the Naga society would bear fruit only if a 'certain-tribe' from Manipur is expelled from it. They would accept the unification move initiated by leading Naga organization like the Naga Hoho and the Church only if the said tribe from Manipur is 'totally ex-communicated from Naga society'.
Concluded
(Courtesy: The Sangai Express)
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