...why blame fate endlessly

Prove your strength, sister...

Dream your destiny as birthright.¹

A young poet began a fast, never imagining how long it would stretch. With incredible endurance, she carried on for nearly sixteen years, steely strength earning her the sobriquet ‘Iron Irom’. She broke her fast in August 2016, but keeps the dream intact: a dream of peace and justice.

Irom Sharmila speaks truth to power, but the powerful refuse to pay heed. At age 44, the internationally acclaimed non-violent activist is exploring new strategies: collective, electoral. Young people gather around her, trusting her purity of purpose; incredibly within a few weeks, a political party has taken shape. This never-say-die woman is stepping once more into the unknown: the arena of political power.

As was her long fast, so is the new party: unexpected, inspiring. People’s Resurgence and Justice Alliance, PRJA – an acronym evocative because it connotes ‘the people’, and because Praja Shanti Party held power in Manipur during 1948-49 when Manipur enjoyed dominion status, its own constitution and democratically elected government, before it was merged with the Indian Union, most believe forcibly. PRJA places itself firmly within the stream of precious memory, and people’s aspirations. Sharmila says, ‘Our party envisages real democracy, unlike a government built by buying votes.’²

Sharmila is co-convener of the young party. Convener Erendro Lei-chombam, 33, hails from an ordinary family of Imphal, just like Sharmila. Her family practised Vaishnavism as do most Meiteis, and an underlying Sanamahism; Erendro’s family was Buddhist, he studied Economics at Soka University America, Public Administration at Harvard, and now teaches in Guwahati. PRJA’s other co-conveners are Najma Phundreimayum, 43, working since over a decade with sustainable livelihoods, women and child rights – and now the first Muslim woman candidate in Manipur’s electoral history; and 35-year old Mayengbam James, environmentalist and media entrepreneur. Bowang Kho, a Poumai Naga from Senapati district, has also joined the PRJA team. The team is youthful, idealistic, energetic and upbeat.

 

For the upcoming assembly elections, PRJA plans to field twenty candidates from diverse ethnic groups, in this land of ‘nine hills and a valley’. The party stands on four pillars – Justice, Understanding, Love and Peace. It pledges to address militarization, repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), work non-violently for gender justice, economic self-reliance and ethnic reconciliation. Sharmila will contest against Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh in Thoubal, his home constituency. The elections, scheduled for early 2017, will pit PRJA against giants: the Indian National Congress, in power since 2002, and BJP, whose spokesperson S. Tikendra Singh stated, ‘BJP has nothing to say on the formation of a new party by Irom Chanu Sharmila… The four pillars of her foundation – understanding, justice, peace and love are all in BJP’s philosophy’!³

Power needs to be handled well for the best ends, and then that power may be a good thing. It is only the pure-hearted who can openly, unselfconsciously, unapologetically, say ‘I want power’ – the pure-hearted or else the absolutely vile, evil ones. Clearly Sharmila desires power in order to deploy it for the common good. PRJA identifies with clean politics – not bribes, freebies or big money – and they hope to win because people trust them.

PRJA kicked-off its election campaign on 2 November 2016 at Malom village, near Imphal. Exactly sixteen years earlier, ten innocent persons standing at Malom bus stop were shot dead by paramilitary personnel: this massacre moved Sharmila to launch her fast, demanding an end to atrocities. Families of victims held a sixteenth-anniversary memorial service, Sharmila attending; afterward she spoke about her new party pursuing the same unfinished agenda. Enthusiastically, people donated into the party kitty: maybe only Rs 10, but it counts.

 

Integrity, authenticity, communicates. ‘My stand is for the sake of truth, and I believe truth succeeds eventually. How shall I explain it, we all come here with a task to do. And we come here alone…’⁴ Her task in the world, born of love and compassion, flows into action. Will she storm the lion’s den then, make a difference in the murky world of politics, with her team of peace warriors?

She says, ‘Winning elections, I am told, needs many things, but I have nothing. Every time I feel anxious about the elections, I say to God, let it be your will, I know nothing, I am nothing. I have nothing to fight an election – only the heart of a human being.’⁵ Non-violence, same as love, works through the human heart and is an active force, active even when we sleep. It is the weapon of the strong: implying ethical choice, balanced against sheer expediency.⁶

Irom Sharmila is the best-known, most visible face of the struggle against militarization. But in fact she is one of many: militarization is opposed in Manipur by long-standing women’s and human rights movements, and ordinary people, caught in the crossfire between insurgents and security forces. She represents, for the rest of the world, Manipuri people’s aspiration for peace.

 

I’ll spread the fragrance of peace

From Kanglei,⁷ my birthplace

In the ages to come

It will spread all over the world.⁸

 

After completing school in 1991, Sharmila explored journalism, social work and activism, especially with intrepid women activists, Meira Paibis. Ever since Manipur was declared ‘disturbed’ in 1980 and AFSPA imposed throughout the state to deal with a handful of insurgents, Meira Paibis exposed atrocities, committed with impunity under cover of this draconian law. In October 2000, Sharmila interned with Human Rights Alert (HRA), met victims of violence and their families and learnt about global human rights. In early November she unilaterally began her indefinite fast, demanding repeal of AFSPA. Police picked her up; local courts convicted and jailed her, year after year.

Meanwhile violence spiralled throughout the state, brute force masquerading as counter-insurgency, in fact turning angry young men towards underground groups (UGs). On 11 July 2004, Assam Rifles personnel gang-raped, abducted and brutally murdered a young woman, Thangjam Manorama. Activists point out that this was not the first time a woman was sexually assaulted by armed forces personnel.⁹ Twelve Meira Paibis staged a desperate protest on 15 July – disrobing at the gate of Kangla Fort, banners blazing: ‘Indian Army, Rape Us, Take Our Flesh’. One activist noted, ‘Our anger made us shed our inhibitions that day. If necessary we will die – commit self-immolation to save our innocent sons and daughters… Our fight is to protect human rights which are being misused under AFSPA.’¹⁰

As with Sharmila’s continuous fast, Meira Paibis transformed themselves from helpless victims into active agents, pitting body and soul against injustice and violation. Symbolizing individual and collective confrontation of abuse, these cutting edge protests drew world attention, shamed the perpetrators and achieved a temporary inversion of power, making it possible to imagine enduring struggles. The protests pushed the Indian government to lift AFSPA from Imphal; set up the Justice Jeevan Reddy Committee to review the act; and return Kangla – occupied by the British since 1891 and later by Assam Rifles – to the people of Manipur. These important moves were wrested through extraordinary civic activism; however, the government refused to acknowledge the Justice Reddy Committee report (2005) which recommended repealing the ‘much-hated’ AFSPA. The twelve brave protesters were arrested, jailed for three months, and a ban placed on rallies at significant spots in Imphal.

We can begin to understand Sharmila’s dedication only if we appreciate her context – dignified, immensely cultured people fighting for identity and survival; strong women’s movements including Nupilans (Women’s Wars: 1904 and 1939) against colonial exploitation; Indian armed forces violating democratic rights with impunity, perceived as an army of occupation; a frontier state at the margins of India, smarting under the humiliation of lost sovereignty; inter-ethnic conflicts cynically manipulated by governments; dysfunctional public health and education systems; high levels of unemployment. Once a self-sufficient kingdom, Manipur is today a ‘special category state’ dependent on the Centre for 90 per cent of its annual budget. Underground groups demand liberation or a popular referendum; people in general want state repression to end, governments to govern, basic needs to be met and fundamental rights respected.

 

On 2 October 2006, Sharmila, released as she was every year, flew to New Delhi to generate wider public awareness. To a bunch of university students she said, ‘I act on my conscience as a rational being… I want to be a symbol of justice.’¹¹ The police picked her up from Jantar Mantar and brought her to AIIMS (All India Institute of Medical Sciences). When I went to the hospital to pay my respects, I found a warm, friendly young woman, glad for conversation: we talked of our families, books we were reading, sundry thoughts and happenings. Once I asked Irom Singhajit, who took excellent care of his sister, where Sharmila’s strength came from; he replied, ‘It is from our grandmother. She taught us, if you find gold don’t pick it up, it isn’t yours… If you have nothing else to give, you can always give a smile!’

In 2007, I visited her high-security hospital room in Imphal. Sharmila broke into a delighted smile, enquired if I’d eaten Manipuri curries yet and offered to cook, one day, sagem pamba, a favourite dish… She recited stanzas from ‘Rebirth’, a 1,010-line poem she’d just completed. I visited her family, mother Sakhi Devi brave and sad; grandmother Tonsija Devi, 104, remembered the 1939 Nupilan: ‘All the women of Manipur gheraoed the Durbar’ until their demand to end rice export was met. A thread connects Sharmila with her grandmother… a strong thread of homespun wisdom, and active resistance to injustice.

 

On Human Rights Day, 10 December 2008, Meira Paibis formed Sharmila Kunba Lup (SKL), to ‘Save Sharmila Repeal AFSPA’, and launched a remarkable relay hunger strike, running over years, in a bamboo shed adjoining the Jawaharlal Nehru Hospital, (now called Jawaharlal Nehru Institute of Medical Sciences, JNIMS) where Sharmila was incarcerated. In 2009, human rights groups organized a ‘Festival of Peace, Justice and Hope’ – protest films, plays, book release, music and talks; heads of diverse religions prayed for an end to violence in Manipur; writer Mahasweta Devi spoke: ‘The twenty-first century is the century of Irom Sharmila. Her story is the story of mother earth…’

Across the country hundreds of solidarity events were organized. In 2010 a peace march journeyed from Kerala to Imphal;¹² a young woman from Pune staged a street play on salient issues hundreds of times; young people from Delhi and elsewhere formed a Save Sharmila Solidarity Campaign and organized rallies, demonstrations, candle vigils, human chains, meetings, write-ups, delegations, a Srinagar-Imphal yatra and a signature campaign that received thousands of signatures. UNESCO’s Commission for Human Rights wrote to the Indian government questioning the continuing imprisonment of Irom Sharmila. She was awarded the Gwangju Human Rights Award, her profile included as a prisoner of conscience at a well attended exhibition in California (2014-2015) from where some 8,000 visitors sent her postcards.

 

Sharmila, locked up, made new friends, even fell in love. Her special admirer sent her books, music and comforting letters. But he also claimed to be the only person who genuinely cared for her, and was dismissive of all her other supporters and co-activists. This contributed to a temporary wedge between Sharmila and some of her long-standing colleagues and family members. She was distressed and possibly confused, but with innate dignity, kept her routine going: one hour in the sun every morning, sweeping her room, washing clothes, reading The Sangai Times (a daily gift from the newspaper hawker), chatting with nurses who came to pour feed down her Ryle’s tube; thinking, writing, dreaming; watering her plants, watching each tiny leaf grow. Several friends and supporters were asking her to give up the fast, come out and continue the struggle. Gradually she arrived at the same conclusion, revealing later, ‘I was completely fed up. Like Abhimanyu, I was caught in a chakravyuha and didn’t know how to get out!’

 

Meanwhile Manipur was at boiling point. Hill-valley issues were exploding: Naga territorial demands manipulated by a government championing ‘territorial integrity’ and conflict peaked during 2009-2010; Kuki demand for a separate district escalated, by 2011, for a separate state. There was no let-up in ‘encounter killings’ either: a climate of impunity prevailed even after AFSPA was lifted from Imphal, with police specially trained to act along similar lines.

Human rights activists had their work cut out. They helped widowed women come together and form the Extra-Judicial Execution Victim Families Association (EEVFAM). In 2012, EEVFAM and HRA filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court of India, appealing for a judicial inquiry into over 1,500 cases of extrajudicial execution. The Supreme Court appointed a high-level commission: Justice Hegde Commission probed the first six cases, and found all to be fake encounters. Victims included 12-year old Mohammed Azad Khan, dragged out of his house on 8 January 2009 by about thirty security personnel, beaten up and shot; there wasn’t a shred of evidence against him or any of the other victims. The Hegde Commission categorically stated, ‘…legal bounds are being transgressed in counter-insurgency operations’ and appreciated that ‘civil society in the state… has raised the level of social consciousness well above the average in the country.’¹³

 

In July 2016, the Supreme Court ordered a probe into all 1,528 cases of extrajudicial killings, noting that any allegation of excessive force resulting in death must be thoroughly inquired into – this is the requirement of democracy and the rule of law. If security forces are deployed for an indeterminate period of time, as in Manipur, it points to a systemic failure of governance.¹⁴ According to the report of Directorate of Intelligence Bureau for the Northeast, 8993 people were killed in alleged fake encounters between 1991 and 2012 in Manipur.¹⁵

HRA volunteers have fanned out across all the districts of Manipur, roping in Jindal Global Law School to provide technical support, engaging in groundwork probing 1,528 instances of extrajudicial killings, as required by the Supreme Court. This critical case ongoing in the apex court holds enormous implications for defence of human rights, not only in Manipur but also in Nagaland, Jammu and Kashmir and elsewhere.

 

Irom Sharmila broke her fast on 9 August 2016.

 

Unbind me

From this chain of thorns

That binds me in this

Narrow room

For no fault of mine

A caged bird

In this sinister prison cell.¹⁶

 

She continued in hospital so that her health could be monitored; friends brought provisions and home cooked food, stayed the night, chatted by day. She remarked, ‘My friends are habituated to helping me!’¹⁷

Meira Paibis held discussions with her and clarified they do not believe in entering politics. Despite their disagreement on this matter, Meira Paibis and Irom continue to closely interact. The Naga People’s Movement for Human Rights (NPMHR) invited Irom Sharmila to visit Ukhrul and stay with them, a rare invitation: her stand against AFSPA represents common ground between Naga and valley groups. The same week, Naga Students’ Federation, Naga Mothers’ Association, NPMHR and Naga Hoho were holding massive anti-AFSPA rallies across districts of Manipur and Nagaland.¹⁸

 

I spent some time with Sharmila: we walked the hospital corridor for hours, and talked – of politics, life and love. The National Association of People’s Movements (NAPM) invited her to visit; so did Manipur Red Cross Society and Children’s Home, Senapati. ‘I think I will go wherever I am invited,’ she said . Long-time mentor Babloo Loitongbam, Director of HRA, agreed: ‘She has been isolated so long; she needs to meet people!’

Fourteenth August is celebrated as Manipur Independence Day, the day the British granted it dominion status in 1947. On 15 August, a general strike was imposed by militants. ‘I am not a separatist,’ Sharmila pronounced thoughtfully. ‘My struggle is for justice, peace… and love.’

She mused, ‘One chapter of my life is ending, a new chapter beginning. Life is completely unknown. Here I am, making breakfast!’ – cornflakes and oats in hot water. Dr L. Ranbir Singh, Medical Superintendent, JNIMS, exclaimed, ‘We have examined Sharmila thoroughly. She is fit, physically and mentally, due to yoga! There is no precedent in medical history.’

When I visited her family, brother Singhajit conveyed, ‘Our home is always open to Sharmila…. We love her a lot.’ Sharmila recalled, ‘When I was a child my extended family lived together, cooked together, maybe fifty people in all. I am used to lots of people around me.’ On 18 August her mother visited: mother and daughter sat with arms linked, drawing comfort from one another; later Sharmila pensively noted, ‘My mother understands me best, more than anybody else.’

On 2 October 2016, in Delhi for a few days, Sharmila visited Rajghat to pay tribute to Gandhi. She talked to university students, and citizen’s groups. She likes to keep up with friends, so came to visit me; what a joy to watch her savour the sweet taste of a laddu – she who refused to taste even water for years on end!

 

Irom Sharmila has sacrificed precious years for the sake of the common good and could well choose to retire now, to pursue life’s simple pleasures. However, she is determined to continue on an uphill track: ‘I have thrown a challenge to the people of Manipur.’ If they vote her in, she will face further challenges.

Manipur is rich in music, theatre, philosophy, sports, histories of plurality and coexistence. Yet today it is fragile, a society under siege since decades, rent by intense conflicts worsened by governmental divide and rule, with hardening inter-ethnic divisions. The Centre imagines the Northeast frontiers recalibrated as gateways to Southeast Asia, the ‘Look East’ policy refurbished (in 2014) as ‘Act East’ policy envisaging large-scale exploitation of natural resources and improved connectivity; but local people dread new forms of cultural domination. This has lent momentum to the demand for an Inner Line Permit which would exclude non-Manipuri Indians from settling in Manipur. Once in power, Sharmila would need to seriously engage with each and every issue, one more complicated than the other.

Unlike Aung Saan Suu Kyi in neighbouring Myanmar, similarly released after years of detention, Sharmila has no political background or a long established popular party. What she has in ample measure is moral force. Like Suu Kyi, she seems to represent the ‘supremacy of moral force over force based on the might of arms and empire.’¹⁹ As she morphs from poet to politician, however, she too may make mistakes, for surely she has human flaws and shortcomings. Sharmila may win the elections or she may – like Medha Patkar, otherwise rooted in people-power – lose. Manipur’s first woman MP, Kim Gangte, elected in 1998 on a CPI ticket, was later defeated: Gangte continued as a social worker, ‘working personally with the people I love… There was so much suffering, so many problems that we were lost as to how to solve them... Across the mountains, no one knew our cries or heard our moaning and groaning.’²⁰

 

Beyond the charisma of one individual, the balance of several forces makes for victory or defeat in elections, and in the larger project of bringing about a sea change in the fortunes of a state. If Irom Sharmila is to succeed even partially in her mission, she would need above all to remain connected with ordinary people, youth, human rights and women’s movements.

Meira Paibis are a dejected lot, despite their enormous sacrifices. ‘Politicians make tall claims in their manifestos and then rush to grab credit for the little change that has taken place after we, old women, faced tear gas, spent days in jail, and protested under the harsh sun,’ fumes Ima Ibemhal, referring to Chief Minister Ibobi Singh taking the credit for removal of Assam Rifles from Kangla Fort. Ima Taruni adds, ‘We have seen two Nupi Lans, we are preparing for the third. Not just with five or ten women but all women. We need a united force.’²¹ Human rights activists are battling on with the strenuous work of gathering evidence for hundreds of extrajudicial killings, overwhelmed by the scale of atrocities, somehow meeting the demands upon their time and energy: they do so invisibly, away from the limelight. It is in some ways a thankless job, yet absolutely critical.

Assuming that she remains sincere and uncorrupted, Irom Sharmila would work to shift the paradigm from military ‘solutions’ to political engagement with citizens across the board. PRJA would work to ensure an authentic process of development, with food security, employment, economic revival, healthcare, education for all. A mature leadership would move to transform multiple conflicts – peaceful coexistence may be possible, if grievances are respectfully heard, solutions arrived at after arduous negotiation, historical injustices corrected, justice delivered and seen to be delivered.

 

Sharmila represents the voice of conscience in a crisis-ridden world. We look upon such a person to respond from her depths to each new situation, remain true to her light. She embodies the ever-powerful idea of cleansing, and starting anew. She also poses, by her very being, a continuous challenge to the rest of us, especially those moved by her long struggle. If she is no goddess, but an ordinary human being, is it possible for us, too, to be ordinary human beings?

 

Footnotes:

1. Irom Sharmila Chanu, ‘Be Brave, Sister’, in Fragrance of Peace (poems in Meitei, with English translations). Zubaan, New Delhi, 2010.

2. Grace Jajo, ‘Irom Sharmila Launches Her Political Innings with PRJA, Will Contest Against Manipur CM’, North-East Today, 18 October 2016.

3. Staff Reporter, ‘Sharmila to Take on Chief Minister – New Party Peoples Resurgence and Justice Alliance Launched’, Imphal Free Press, 19 August 2016.

4. Kavita Joshi, ‘My Fasting is a Means; I Have No Other’, Infochange India News and Features, November 2006.

5. Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty, ‘I Have Nothing to Fight Elections, Only the Heart of a Human Being’, The Wire, 1 October 2016.

6. Based on M.K. Gandhi, ‘A Talk on Non-Violence’, Harijan, 14 March 1936, in M.K. Gandhi, Non-Violence in Peace and War. Navjivan Publishing House, Ahmedabad, 1942, pp. 154-57.

7. Kanglei, short name of Kangleipak, one of the archaic names of Manipur.

8. For the full poem, see Deepti Priya Mehrotra, Burning Bright: Irom Sharmila and the Struggle for Peace in Manipur. Penguin, 2015 (revised; first edition 2009), p. 179; poem originally translated by Tayenjam Bijoykumar Singh.

9. Gunjan Veda, Tailoring Peace: The Citizens’ Roundtable on Manipur and Beyond. North East Network, Guwahati, 2005.

10. Khelena Thokchom, ‘She Stoops to Conquer’, The Telegraph, 25 July 2004.

11. Students were from Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi University.

12. Hind Swaraj Peace March, organized by civil society groups from Kerala, May 2010.

13. Justice N. Santosh Hegde, J.M. Lyngdoh and Ajai Kumar Singh, Report of the Supreme Court Appointed Commission, New Delhi, 30 March 2013.

14. Justice Madan B. Lokur, Judgment, in the Supreme Court of India, Criminal Original Jurisdiction, Writ Petition (Criminal) No.129 of 2012, New Delhi, 8 July 2016.

15. Cited by Nomita Takhlchangbam at a consultation, ‘United Nations and AFSPA’ organized by Youth Forum for Protection of Human Rights (YFPHR), North East Dialogue Forum (NEDF) and Youths of Manipur (YOM), Imphal, 14 August 2016.

16. Irom Sharmila Chanu, ‘Unbind Me’, in Fragrance of Peace, op. cit., fn. 1.

17. Deepti Priya Mehrotra, ‘Break-Fast Chronicles: Irom Sharmila Begins a New Chapter’, The Telegraph, 22 August 2016.

18. ‘Thousands March for Repeal of AFSPA’, Morung Express News, Dimapur, 12 August 2016.

19. Aung San Suu Kyi, ‘May We Go Forward in Disciplined Strength’, speech delivered on 10 February 1995.

20. Thingnam Anjulika Samom,‘Kim Gangte: Manipur’s First Woman MP’, The Sangai Express, 14 December 2006.

21. Thingnam Anjulika Samom, ‘Kangla Mothers Recall Unique Protest: Dejected by Continued Killings and Rape’, Huieyen News Service, 24 November 2014.