Senapati, July 18: The All Naga Students' Association, Manipur (ANSAM) has expressed its "gratitude" for the memorandum submitted by the rallyists of July 9 to the Chief Minister of Manipur demanding a white paper on the burning of Government schools in the hill districts.

"We have been given the required materials and inspiration to counter the memorandum, supposedly representative of the majority valley community view on the issue of affiliation to the Nagaland Board of School Education (NBSE) and to reiterate why tribals must opt for a different syllabus and system to protect their identity and culture", stated ANSAM.

The Naga students body said that some decades ago, its adversaries devised a sinister plan - to keep the tribals under subjugation, weaken them by any means, stifle their intellectual growth and make them forget who they are.

make them forget who they are.

ANSAM said that the majority community in the Manipur valley played into these hands of this greater plan.

"When the simple tribals became educated and empowered, they became insecure and started to devise ways and means to perpetuate the subjugation and exploitation of the tribals.

The devices were engineered to dilute and decimate the growing consciousness of the tribal identity.

Language, school curriculum and the history and culture embodied in them became the chief means for doing so," alleges the Naga students body.

It also said that the Government schools in the hills today stand as the symbols of the majority valley community's hegemony and instruments for imposing their language, culture and history on the tribals of the hills.

ANSAM fumed that the majority valley community's imagination cannot even for once appreciate the fact that their hearts would bleed if they were maneuvered into a position where they would be advantaged only if they learned and accepted a tribal language as their lingua franca and then gradually find that education is useless without mastery of that alien language, idiom and culture.

"But this process of assimilation is happening to the tribals of Manipur", further alleged the ANSAM.

However, the majority Manipur valley community in their ethno-centric consciousness are conveniently oblivious to their ban on Hindi songs and movies, said the ANSAM statement, adding, "What majority Manipur valley community feels about Hindi songs and cinemas is not any different from what tribals feel about Meitei Ion, Meitei Mayek and Meitei history and Meitei culture imposed on them".

"There would be tribals who speak, read and write better Meiteilon than Meiteis themselves.

They are the exceptions and good for them.

The norm is that apart from being a bazaar language in townships, the ordinary tribal still think in his or her own language and the niceties, the nuances and complex concepts in Meiteilon are as unmanageable and incomprehensible as Greek is to them.

While this is the condition, proficiency in Meiteilon, and knowledge of Meitei idioms and history are being imposed as the standards for excellence and communication in the day to day life of the tribals," explained the ANSAM statement.

It then asked as to why would the Hericoun, Meelal, Tips, Wakak, Desam and other rallyists of the July 9 cry horse on the burning of Government schools which have become instruments of cultural imperialism of the majority Manipur valley community, calling it an assault on the temples of learning and yet at the same brazenly using the Meitei Mayek on banners in the protest rally of July 9."What more would demonstrate, the hegemonistic and insensitive attitude of the valley community?," questioned the Naga students body.

"How many Meiteis are well versed in the concocted Meitei script which has 20, 30, 40 alphabets at different times and which is being sadistically imposed on the tribals with the clear message 'learn Meiteilon, learn Meitei Mayek, learn Meitei history and culture and you will be all right, you will be advantaged, you will be successful in Meitei land, but you might very well forget who you are", asserted the ANSAM.

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