My house is not very far from the airport and
hence I asked one of my close friend to pick me up by just
coming with a scooter, though I didn't have
to ask as he knows my arrival. One reason for asking my friend is
that the taxi drivers charge unbelievable
rates -which is something hard to digest- assuming that all the
passengers are all rich people, they can ask
any amount they wish to get. Once I had an argument with one
Taxi driver as he asked me to take 250 Rs
for a mere 8 km -from airport to Singjamei. He argued that he
was an unemployed BA and that the trip was
the only one per day and had to take 'reasonable' amount from
the 'rich' people. I blasted that fellow nicely.
For, I saw many reasons: (a) he doesn't do his business
professionally, just sits around playing cards
or ludo and waiting for the lone flight to come, (b) has the
'extortionism' in his mind -taking a big amount
in 5 min, contrary to hours of sitting by the Ima Keithel
Phambees -women vendors and earning a meager
income, (c) always contents by using the excuse of
unemployment (govt. unemployment -startle
speaking). This made me quite upset of the kind of work culture
going on the state. Compare to the state's
low per capita, some of the markets do exist albeit nonsense price.
For example, the price of a photocopy (Xerox)
is 2 Rs and I think this could be the reason why the students
of Manipur take photocopies of only certificates/documents
and not important text books. Still now there is
an ongoing debate/resentment of the nonavailability
of the text books. If the charge of a photocopy had been
50 paise, say, then at least some of the students
could have been better off. Anyway these are different issues
not to discuss now.
Often, whenever I made a trip to home, I used
to dream of a better Manipur in terms of infrastructure,
education system, political situation and
the dream never came true. But this time, I would say, the state was
slightly in a little peaceful and amicable
situation than before, a few bandh calls notwithstanding. During the
first few days I found the whole economy of
the state totally down. For there was a join strike of no work by
the state employees as long as the govt. did
not make an agreement of giving central level pay. The economy
was in total doldrums. Some of the things
I could observe were that people did not eat fish as price of rohu
reached an all time low of Rs 20/25 a Kilo,
did not give bills/credits, postpone ceremonies. Statistically
speaking, all the demands of food, goods and
services went down very low and hence no income was also
generated for other non-governmental workers.
Everybody seemed to have a dull life as there was very less
activity in all respects, say even in entertainment,
appointments, going out and like. But as the govt. could
come out with an agreement with JAC of the
state employees, life seemed to come back to normal.
Then came full preparations for the much hyped
5th National Games to be held in Imphal. Almost all the
people from a 5 yr. old child to a centurion
is very much involved in the mind setting of the Game. The
newspapers, AIR and DDK Imphal give all the
information related to the game round the clock. The
government make a routine check up of the
constructions. The UG personals make sure that work is serious
and not Thika type. Students, club and Meira
Paibee (women torch bearers) organisation came out to
volunteer for holding the Game successfully.
They also appeal to other groups/organisation not to give any
disturbance like strike or bandh during the
Game. I, myself, have gone to the Khuman Lampak Sports
Complex and it's a great achievement for the
state to be able to possess such a huge, compact and complete
sports complex. The state is going to show
off its rich culture in the opening and closing ceremonies of the
Game, with the President and Prime Minister,
Govt of India already given confirmation to be present for both
the ceremonies respectively. As far as I heard
some 800 school students, 1000 artists, good at martial and
cultural items are going to perform some cultural
show. The main attraction will be the choreography in the
form Lairen Mathek of Lai Haraoba, the Pung
Cholom. It will be pity for those people specially Manipuris to
miss this mega event.
There are many good reasons -apart from the
above reason- that the year 1999 can be announced as the
Sport Year of Manipur. To start with, Dingko
Singh brought the year as a gift for the Manipuris, by winning
an 'Asian Gold'. In terms of celebration and
recognition, it's not exaggerating to say that Dingko Singh has
reached zenith. Everybody talks of him every
other day. During my whole 25 days stay at home, everyday
there was at least one column on Dingko about
felicitation by some other club or organsation. Ultimately it
was like -I'm fed up to hear about him. There
are many fans of his and teenaged girls are the front runners to
get autograph from him. Then as Dingko Singh
left Manipur for Mumbai, the 34th National Junior Footbal
arrived at Imphal. Manipur played brilliantly
under the coaching of Shantikumar. Manipur took the
championship by drubbing Sikkim 4-1 in the
final match, played at the Main Stadium which was also
inaugurated on that day in the full format
of holdin! g National Games. Wouldn't it be nice to end the millenium
with unprecedented exposure of the state to
the outside world?
I also could notice a lot of Dev-Karma being
held as the season was Phairen-Panchami in which everything
seems to be auspicious for anything to be
done. There were Lukun Thangba, Na Hutpa, Yum Shangaba and
mother of all ceremonies -the Lu Hongba (and
obviously the Heijingpots). I could notice too many weddings
this season and most of the brides and grooms
seem to be very young, say all around 21/22 yr. old. At the
present situation of Manipur, I do not encourage
these weddings, as I feel that often they will lend up to be
below the poverty line and hence coming out
all kinds of problems. Here I'm not the mentioning the frequent
case of AIDS victims -a story a Manipuri is
fed to hear. On other hand if one looks at the communal way of
helping each other in any crisis or ceremonies,
there seems to have some unique culture. I, myself, offered to
help in renovating one of my friend's house
as his brother got married. Like this, the expenditure of the
arrangements for any ceremony ! in Manipur
is very much reduced compared to other state. The amount of
services offered by the girls and boys are
simply enormous to evaluate. This kind of culture of helping each
other out in any ceremony is quite rare to
find in other parts of the country. Again, in terms of monetary help,
all the invitees give a 'standard' sum of
money -called the Poiyeng to the host. One can distribute equally to
the artists of Not Sanskritan in appreciation
of their singing. But often during this season most of the family
lend up in financial crisis because of too
many obligatory invitations. Thus there is a debate whether the culture
of Poiyeng is good or bad. For me, I would
argue for the good sake.