Political tit for tat : Borayangbi villagers are all on their toes

M.U Faruque *

Borayangbi is one of the remotest muslim inhabited village of 2 sq.km area which falls under Kumbi assembly constitution in Bishnupur district Manipur. Villagers are now living under doubt and curiosities over the transferred of Gram Rozgar Sahayak (GRS) of Borayangbi GP to other Gram Panchayat.

Approximately 62 kilometers away from the capital Imphal , Borayangbi village is resided by only Meitei‐pangal (Muslim) , having 2000 voters (according to census 2011) is one of the most backward village among the minorities Muslim inhabited villages in the state. Socially as wel as economically borayangbi village stay behind the curve.

As away from cities and towns villagers faced several problems every day, from hospitality to communication to education. As far as education is concern there are only three persons in the village who hold master degree and fifteen persons who finished graduation. There are two primary school in the village out of which one is governmentaided, which are recently upgraded to junior high school by the government.

Almost ninety five per cent of the children are school goers, but hardly two‐three students could pass in the HSLC Exam each year in the last decade. Why the students are not able to pass the HSLC Exam?

Beside the comparatively low pass percentage, those who passed were also obtained less marks, mostly third and second division. Here the one exception is Mr. Helalluddin, who was born at Borayangbi and grown at Dimapur top the HSLC Examination conducted by Nagaland Board of School Education in 2013.

In the last two years one can see some development in education due to the efforts of localities and concern MLA but that cannot be count as remarkable progress, but still lack of qualified teacher and infrastructure is a main issue.

In terms of employment Borayangbi has two primary school teachers out of which one is govt. aided teacher, and one trained graduate teacher, no post graduate teacher, lecture etc. so far till now. There are five person who are the grade four employee and fourteen person who are the constable in paramilitary forces and state police, no SI,ASI, or equivalent rank or above till now.

No doctor or engineer has born. Rest of the population are farmers. Above all drinking water supply is not available, and inter village road are also not concrete. The state highway which connect the NH 2 through Moirang via kumbi is once going through Borayangbi had diverged and now going through Wangoo Ahallup and connect the Sugnu by keeping Borayangbi GP at the corner.

Since then Borayangbi GP had been completely leg behind in any realms of development. After a long and consistent demand of the people of Borayangbi GP, the government is now widening inter village road and the work is still in progressed, and sitting MLA kumbi AC donated two playgrounds recently.

Politicians are always flocked in the village when the election is coming and fade away after it . In fact there is dearth of leader which could bring changes in Borayangbi GP, among the few people, one of the person who consistently worked for bringing changes and development is Muhammad Firoz Khan , a social activist by passion which bear several office in the village level organization , work for promoting communal harmony and community development who once an educated unemployed youth now serve as GRS.

Under his leadership and now as a GRS several remarkable development works had carried out. But there are some political goons who involved in several crimes encumbered the development works in the village. Even though, they stay freely under closed watch of security forces and state police.

Whenever they do anything no one could questioned them, partly because of fear, and partly because they don't want to get involved at anything. They do so because they have a closed link with politician and goons.

But this time people unite and stood against the insatiable decision of the government authority in the case of Mr. Firoz khan, the one and only minority Muslim among twenty four GRS in Bishnupur district, who is transferred to kha‐Thinunggei GP from the Borayangbi GP by an especial order of DPC dated 4th April 2016 with immediate effect.

The villagers take the issue as planned and deliberately attack to the minorities . This political development opened the door for several question in the minds of the people. Because the transferred order dated 4th April 2016 was selectively for MR. firoz khan only, Because he is the only from the minority Meitei‐Pangal who work as GRS in Bishnupur Districts, Because upcoming state assembly election is knocking at the door, and is this transferred related with any hands of politicians?

As a result Borayangbi is now become a panic station. In fact Borayangbi is treated as vote bank by the politician , because of its voter strength. Now the villagers are at loggerheads with the authority over the transferred of Mr. Firoz Khan