No, woman, no cry
Oinam Sunil 7 November 2009, 10:59am IST
Something extraordinary happened in Manipur on July 15, 2004. A bunch of feisty old women, angry at the alleged murder and rape of 30-year-old
Manorama Devi at the hands of the armed police, headed straight to the Kangla Fort, which then housed the Assam Rifles, and stripped themselves bare.
As the nation, which had till then shut its eyes to the deadly implosion in this small northeast state bordering Myanmar, was startled into awakening by shame and disbelief - images of 12 naked "brave mothers" screaming from every newspaper and TV channel - prime minister Manmohan Singh was forced to constitute a committee to review the controversial Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), a law every Manipuri swears has been scandalously misused by the administration.
During his Imphal visit in November that year, the PM met the women and consoled them saying he will give back to Manipur the historic Kangla Fort, which for 113 years had symbolised state excess and repression, first by the British and then by the Assam Rifles. After soldiers of the berated paramilitary force hurriedly vacated the sprawling enclosure, the gift was made to an agonised people on November 20.
Manipur's iconic women protesters had made a telling point yet again, defeating forces mightier than them for the umpteenth time in a struggle for human rights that started more than 100 years ago when they fought the British in 1904 to stop them from compelling local men into forced labour. Nearly 5,000 women had agitated against this and forced the administration to reverse its order. Since then, women here have involved themselves in war at crucial junctures in the state's troubled history whenever they found their men paralysed by brutal regimes.
Another major protest called Nupi Lan (women's uprising) was recorded in 1939. Women launched a violent battle against the oppressive policies of the then maharaja of Manipur, Churachand Singh, and his British agent. The women campaigned hard to abolish the economic policies that permitted rice to be exported out of the kingdom at the cost of its own people's access to food. The women, who controlled the food market, surrounded the State Durbar Office and faced the Assam Rifles, which they are fighting even today. For months, the women who ran the main Khwairamband bazaar in Imphal, refused to operate and ended the boycott only when it appeared that the Japanese, who were already in Myanmar, would enter Imphal. To this day, women control Khwairamband, which is supposed to be the biggest women's market in Southeast Asia.
Circumstances have now forced women to challenge the system. But history and culture have prepared them for their fight. Though Manipuri society is primarily patriarchal, women play an important role as well. The indigenous Sanamahi religion, which Manipuris follow along with Vaishnavism, has both a priest and a priestess, a rare phenomenon. Moreover, in the olden days, the kingdom of Manipur was either constantly at war with Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) or busy battling petulant hill tribes. As the king used men to build his army, taking them on armed expeditions that lasted months, it was left to the women to fill the gaps in society.
This continued after the British conquered Manipur , the country attained independence, and after Manipur merged with India in 1949. As insurgency hit the Imphal valley in the late seventies, the men began disappearing again - just like the time when they had silently followed their kings.
Irom Sharmila Chanu, who has been on an indefinite fast for nine years as she calls for an end to AFSPA, is a shining example of the indomitable spirit of Manipuri women and their resolve to establish a just, peaceful society. Now called "queen of the prison" , she says she will go on as long as her flesh and bones allow her. "I have a dream - a dream that the international community will listen to our voice against human rights abuses in our land," she told TOI-Crest in Imphal a few months ago as she was being produced in court. The 41-year-old , who began her protest after jawans of the Assam Rifles gunned down 10 civilians at Malom, in Imphal West, on November 2, 2000, knows that New Delhi has done nothing about the Justice (retd) B P Jeevan Reddy Committee report that recommended the repeal of AFSPA. She also understands that the Manipur government has quietly rejected her demand. But these "betrayals" have not shaken her. She is determined to continue her fast from inside the security ward of Imphal's J N Hospital.
Sharmila, though, is fortunate to survive. Manorama Devi, picked up by the Assam Rifles on July 10, 2004 for being a suspected member of a banned militant outfit, was found raped and murdered the next morning. Her bullet-riddled body had been flung not far from her house in Ngariyan Hills. It was this that prompted the Meira Paibis (women torchbearers) to do the unprecedented nude demonstration, holding banners with 'Indian Army rape us' written on them.
One of the protesters, 80-year-old Thokchom Ramani, remembers that day clearly: "We knew it was an extreme step for a woman. But when we saw young Manorama violated and murdered despite Assam Rifles issuing her family an arrest memo, we realised that the Act would always be misused. It was raw anger." She also remembers telling her friends that she wanted to teach soldiers and officers of the regiment a lesson. Of course, she is disheartened that nothing much has changed after the movement against AFSPA began in 1980. "But I won't give up until my death. Someday, someone will have to listen to us, to the pain of Manipur, to the relentless attack on our lives and dignity, to the shame and humiliation we go through when we are raped and kicked, when our husbands and sons go missing."
Not that the fights these women mount are aimed just at the armed forces and the state and central governments. Women in Manipur have also had to combat the increasing use of drugs and subsequent emergence of HIV/AIDS as one of the biggest killers of their people. In fact, it was only after women "banned" the sale of Indian made foreign liquor that the government of R K Ranbir Singh imposed prohibition in 1991. Till today, Manipur is officially a dry state.
"There is always something to fight for, to defeat and triumph over,'' says Ramani.
For the women of Manipur, life will always remain a lot less ordinary.
No, woman, no cry - India - The Times of India
