Vandals strike at Jessami

R.K. Tarachand *

A bridge connecting Jessami in Manipur to another village in Nagaland at the border - Pix :: TSE

"Let us not be hackneyed and immobilized by inaction and apathy. People living in our frontiers are being harassed. Their lives and livelihood are at stake. Let us not look back at our shoulders, we have to take the bull by its horns"

Vandals streaked into Jessami, and did as vandals are won't to do, wreak mindless violence and disappeared. Now there are a few things to be contemplated upon.

To begin with the obvious poser, are there really vandals nearby us? To cut short the story, yes, they live on our borders.

Second, is the Jessami incident an isolated factor, No it is not. Vandals have also visited the Dzuko valley in the recent past.

And how have our government reacted to such incidents? They have reacted with stoic and fierce silence, as if they had inadvertently swallowed lumps of alum. 'Shiver me timbers' as that gadfly pirate chief, in the Asterix and Obelix adventures would grate between his teeth.

But what is the genesis of this outrageous violation of our modesty? Is it because we have an affinity to sadistic pain, or is it because we are impotent to react? Or worse, have we taken to be brow beaten as a way of life?

The answer, dear citizen lies in our inability to call a spade, a spade. We live in a make belief world wherein we consider our neighbours to be genteel and cuddly, little realizing that we are living in a fool's paradise.

But it is venom they want, and it should be venom we spit, and may the good Lord have mercy on the souls of these calibans. After all they were created to be chastised. And as the British acknowledged, we are darned good in chastising vandals and goons.

To put matters in the right perspective. To those in the helm of affairs, we say secure our boundaries, remember that old adage, good fences make good neighbours. If the AFSPA is a constraint, then kindly make way for those who do not consider the act as a mill around their necks.

Honestly speaking, as alien it might sound to you, there are people actually better than you. The very thought might sound as anathema to you, much as we consider that you could solve Manipur's problems as anathema to us.

Touche! If you have made your pile, then take a well earned rest. Even King Midas begged that he be rid of gold. I mean, Pahom for all his greed, needed only six feet for his grave, or as is in our culture, in the end, all we need is a forlorn space by the river side to build our funeral pyre.

To get back to our original story, let not greed or incompetence, or both, be an impediment to good governance. As foreign as it may be, let us shed our inhibitions and become responsible people again.

Vandals from the north have always eyed us with covetous consternation. In their virulent outbursts they have attacked our civilized values.

Why do they do it? They do it because they are vandals, and it is the business of vandals to resort to mindless vehemence just for the sake of it.

With apologies to Tennyson 'Theirs not to reason why, theirs but to vandalise'. Some life style, if you can call it that.

The late Carl Sagan, the genius of an astro-physicist, launched the space probe, Voyager I. Voyager has now passed the Kuiper Belt, the frontier of our Solar System and is now hurtling through deep inter stellar space. As Voyager reached Neptune, Carl Sagan turned around the space probe for a final glimpse of Earth. It was seen as a blue orb, smaller than the size of a thumb tack, and Sagan was alluded to have remarked, there is that place wherein all violence, pain and misery have been taking place. And insignificant as it is in the bigger scheme of existence, therein also lies the scourge, that is our northern entity.

Let us not be hackneyed and immobilized by inaction and apathy. People living in our frontiers are being harassed. Their lives and livelihood are at stake. Let us not look back at our shoulders, we have to take the bull by its horns.