GIVE PEACE A CHANCE

SIGN IN HAFLONG, ASSAM

Guns! Guns! Guns!
There is an abundance of weapons in Assam, not all of them carried by soldiers or the police.  India has a gun culture: you see them carried by security outside banks, by police and soldiers at railway stations, outside supermarkets, at crossroads and at sensitive areas where there may be a risk of terrorist attacks on dams and power stations.  Some of the soldiers look like terrorists themselves with fatigues, masks and automatic weapons.  While videoing some soldiers at a truck stop on the highway, one soldier came towards me and signaled for me to stop.  Probably being a foreigner saved my life; otherwise he might have shot me there.

ASSAM RIFLES STATIONED IN HAFLONG

The situation was the same in Sikkim and I wanted to know why there were so many security problems in these areas bordering China, Pakistan, Myanmar, Bhutan and Nepal.  The Assam Tribune carries the headline Chinese Shadow over Arunachal Projects reporting that because of China’s objection to development works in the state, the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank have withdrawn their funding for the improvement of the infrastructure.  Apparently, China considers Arunachal to be disputed territory, that is, a part of China.

MAP OF ARUNACHAL PRADESH BORDERING WITH CHINA

Another headline reads:  Woman Journalist Attacked in Itanagar.  Tongam Rina, the Associate Editor of Arunachal Times was critically injured when unknown gunmen opened fire when she was entering her office.  Other headlines are:  Manipur on Fire; Naga Peace Talks; Assam Riots.  Obviously – apart from the surfacing of the multiple rape cases all over India – all is not well in the North Eastern states. 

                                       

TONGAM RINA

Having been so close to the political troubles in some of the North Eastern states, in Manipur, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh in particular, I wanted to know more about the local troubles caused by tribals as I had seen a few incidents of extortion in Haflong where I’m staying just now: young tribal boys drugged up and menacing scared shopkeepers for money.  So I talked to Tsering Dorje [name changed] from a government office in a village of Assam to find out why these troubles affected the lives of ordinary people and why so little progress was being made.

ONE OF THE MANY WINE SHOPS LINING THE STREET

Tsering looked far too young to have such a senior post in a government office, being responsible for the disbursement of funds to various educational projects in a large district of Assam.  We provide annual school grants and minor repairing grants at the rate of Rs 75,000 [£893] every year, Tsering tells me.  In India, this is a substantial amount for any school to utilise. 

Tsering is highly skilled and knows his remit in detail.  Not only is he responsible for disbursing funds to educational establishments, he also has to verify that the funding has been used correctly.  He therefore has to manage the data using dedicated software as well as travelling around the district to check the veracity of the receipts.  He also has to Place the budget before the Government of Assam…they will take this budget to the central Government, to the Ministry of Human Resource Development and they will formally approve it.

Although Tsering has been in his post for only seven-months, he seems to be highly competent and learning very quickly the challenges of the job.  So far, he says with a forced smile, I don’t see any corruption, but sometimes I get calls from different groups and they are having a ceasefire and already starting a dialogue with the government.  (I suppose that the groups are the armed terrorists.) Sometimes I get calls asking for some money as a help.  But till today I have not provided anything to them as I have already explained to them that I am only a worker out here who is getting only a meagre amount of salary.

Looking downcast, Tsering tells me he has only enough money to look after his extended family.  He tells me there are many groups who are trying to extort money from shopkeepers, government workers and ordinary people.

I got a call from United People Democratic Solidarity movement two-weeks ago.  The area commander wanted Rs 5,000 to help them as their group had an important meeting somewhere and they wanted help from my side.  They told him that every department contributes to their cause.  He says that if he doesn’t give the money they might threaten him.  As an outsider, he does not have any protection from the public.  In his own place, too, there are many groups there.  He knows most of the people from his own village, but they would not have the courage to ask money of him.  But the people from his workplace think he is getting plenty of money.  They see requests for tenders for building works in the newspapers and misconstrue this, thinking that he has access to the funds – in cash.

Tsering told his boss about the demands.  He told me not to stay in the office at night.  They might come at that time.  He says he doesn’t know if anyone else in his office has been approached for money.  If Tsering pays the money, he has no receipt and therefore no guarantee that other groups will not come and demand more money.  I never sit at my table.  It always remains vacant.  Whenever any stranger comes my secretary tells them I am not in and that I’ve gone away on some work.

At the moment I am in Haflong and I'm told by everyone I meet that young groups of boys, tribals in all cases, are demanding money from houses as well as businesses.  For those in government employment, the rate is Rs 10000 per annum [£114 at the current rate of exchange].  This does not exclude the probability of other groups demanding a similar amount.

So this is the situation in one part of  Assam which, according to reports by the autonomous government of the state, is now peaceful and has managed to subdue the tribal groups extorting money from the people.

Tomorrow, I leave for Tripura, another “peaceful” state.  Nagaland, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh are out for foreigners. 

GUWAHATI

A DAY IN THE LIFE

                                    

Morning is dark and I struggle to waken up.  The room isn’t exactly cold but it’s warm under the blankets and the dreams are slow to fade, like water lapping on the shores of a breeze-blown pond amongst the rushes.

Sadhana Hojai visits us in a flat she has lent us early in the morning while the city wakens slowly to the ubiquitous sound of horns from the traffic outside.  She is the head of the Directorate of Welfare of Scheduled Castes in Guwahati, the capital city of Assam.  Being of the scheduled Dimasa caste herself, she is tall  and stately yet elegant wearing a silk sari.  Being a childhood friend of Fulmaya’s, she has offered us a flat to stay in while here.  Sadhana seems busy with little time for much around her, fleeting here and there, explaining briefly how the flat works.

SADHANA HOJAI OUTSIDE HER OFFICE 

Sadhana takes us in her government car to her office.  We sit there and a little old lady brings us black Assamese tea on a tray while Sadhana has her staff box some books and seal them noisily with brown sticky tape.  She has a clipped, commanding voice in what seems to be a variety of languages as the staff are busying themselves around her.

Yesterday, we visited her and her husband in the railway managers’ enclave on the outskirts of the city, a well-maintained suburban village with armed guards at the gate and pretty bungalows surrounded by trees and flowers.  During our conversation on the porch, Sadhana told me that scheduled castes are socially and economically backward.  She is very precise in her figures – six point eight five per cent of the population are considered to be scheduled, she tells me.

Sadhana has held the post of Director since April 2010.  She laughs as she tells me that she had to sit an exam for the job, But what I studied in my graduation came in the exams. 

There is twenty-four staff on her team.  Sadhana’s job is to implement the policies of the government within the limitations of the guidelines.  I think, in the context of Indian administration machinery, how difficult that must be where every stage in the process must be confirmed by clerks and civil servants working with processes set up by the British, insignificantly changed since partition in 1947

I notice that around the office are brown, cardboard files, but although there are plans to computerise the data, Sajhana tells me that this will take some time.  They [Hyderabad] are far ahead of us, she says.

Then on to Sri Sri Thakur’s temple compound in our hired auto-rickshaw.  Thakur is a sect that Fulmaya used to follow in her younger days in Assam.  Since the death of the founder, his son, Sri Sri Dada has taken over and, as with the tradition of dynastic rule in India, he wants to expand his temple complex.

SRI SRI THAKUR'S TEMPLE

We wander around for a while in the peace and quiet of the grounds and come across a little man with pan-stained teeth standing at the entrance to his room.  He immediately begins to proselytise and his forcefulness –along with his rotting teeth – put us off going any further into the whys and wherefores of the Thakur sect.

Around the compound are signs attached to low railings in English, Assamese and Hindi.  There are some very strange sayings which require a few semantic somersaults:  KNOWLEDGE THAT DOES NOT KNOW TO APPLY IS A DIZZLING IGNORANCE; A DISTURBED OR DEPRESSED MIND IS An INDICATION OF IRREGULAR FUNCTION OF PHYSIC; CHASTITY SPECIALLY DEVOTES FEMAILS BECAUSE THEY CONCEIVE.  Each sign is attributed to Sri Sri Thakur.

After this head-spinning assault on the mind, we jump in our auto-rickshaw and take off for another of Fulmaya’s childhood friends, Basanti.

After the preliminary cups of tea and the sharing of Indian sweets bought in a shop on the way to Basanti’s house, I notice that the old man sitting facing me and talking away in Indian English is not Basanti’s father but her husband who, at 76 years old, is at least twenty-years older than her.  We have a desultory and rather depressing conversation about how he has become old and has only the TV and the newspaper to read now while the ladies laugh and blow the gaff in the kitchen while they prepare a meal.

With the sun glares behind him, his white hair gllistenes and the wrinkled skin of his hands hangs like empty sacks.  On the wall behind me is a photo with his name inscribed on the bottom: Captain Shantimoy Bhattacharjee.  Jeez, he looks so young and cavalier in his uniform compared to this old man sitting in front of me.

CAPTAIN SHANTINMOY BHATTACHARJEE (RETIRED)

He tells me he was born and brought up in East Pakistan (later to become Bangladesh) but after partition in 1947, being a Brahmin Hindu, his mother decided to leave for India.  After his stint in the army which he didn't like, he left and joined the Indian police force and was posted to Mizoram, a troubled state in North East India.  He continued to regale me about the political situations with what sounded to me like unpronounceable names of ministers and officials.  I was appointed Gazetted Deputy Supervisor of the Police then after that I retired in 1999, I think. 

He went on to tell me how he had to deal with malcontents.  Sometimes they would come to my house.  He would say to them, You are also my brothers – containment – some of them were misguided.  They would come with a gun and automatic rifles to my house.  I was not scared of them, I just offered them tea, etc. and some food also.  They asked, what to do?  What is your advice to us?  You give up all these things.  You are in a democratic country, so democratically, you try to solve the problem.

Shantimoy told me the hostiles were Mizo tribals.  Mizo people, all are Christian, he told me.  They all went to church on a Sunday carrying their bibles.

By the time lunch was served, we sat at the table and I had a kind of respect for Shantimoy.  His first wife had died and he had had two children to take care of.  He then married Basanti and had a further three-children, two-boys and a girl.  He aplogised for the humble meal set before us, rice, daal and some vegetables.

After food, we thanked them and left on the auto-rickshaw waiting outside for us.  At the flat, we relaxed and watched some silly movies on Sky, went to bed and thought of the next day’s events with Fulmaya’s brother, sister and sister-in-law from Kathmandu.

PHOTO OF A YOUNG FULMAYA (ON THE LEFT) FROM BASANTI'S ALBUM

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