Irom Sharmila may not just have set a world record as the only human so far to have accomplished the feat of being on a hunger strike for 14 years, but also of setting a record which no other human may ever break. Yesterday, Sharmila entered her 15th year of fast, and there is no indication at all she is about to end it. It may be recalled, 14 years ago, following a massacre of 10 bystanders by troops at a bus shed at the Imphal suburb of Malom, Sharmila began her epic resistance, demanding the repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, AFSPA, 1958. She has not tasted food ever since though she is kept alive by forced nose feeding in a special jail ward at the JN Hospital, Imphal. It is difficult even to imagine the magnitude of her sacrifice. Food is not just about nutrition. Otherwise a few nutrients packed pills may well substitute our daily meals. Its understated gratification is also about taste, smell and sight which trigger appetite and desire in the beholder. For those who have always had food on the table, and who have no fear this will never be otherwise, the magnitude of what Sharmila is giving up may not register instinctively, but for those who have known hunger, and for whom its prospects are still real, few other things can come across as a bigger dread. Sharmila has been voluntarily courting this dread for a humanitarian cause, giving up in the process, some of the most vital and pleasurable sensory faculties of not just humans but of all living organisms.
The fact also is, beyond the cause of her heroic battle, she is also unwittingly redefining the unwritten understanding of records people set. It is often said records are made to be broken, and indeed history has been evidence this is actually so, but Sharmila may have turned this understanding upside down already, though hers is not a record hunt in any way. It is unimaginable that any other in the generations to follow, will ever be in Sharmila’s position or have her will even if they were, to accomplish her feat. Moreover, she is still raising the bar higher, and nobody can as yet foresee much higher she would have raised it when this extremely unseemly chapter finally comes to a close, either by a repeal of the AFSPA or Sharmila dies of old age. We do hope the earlier is the case, and the sooner the better.
Without trivialising the issue, it would however be interesting to see how records once thought would remain unbroken have almost always fallen. The pattern has been for a barrier to be broken by one man first and then, as if a floodgate has been opened, many would cross the barrier. This is especially true of athletics, the purest of all sports. To name just a few landmarks, Roger Bannister running the mile in under 4 minutes in 1954 is stuff of athletic legend even today. Johnathan Landy would follow suit almost immediately, and then within a year, 24 other middle distance runners too. Today, the best runners in the world do the distance in about 3 and half minutes. The same can be said of Jim Hines running the 100 metres race in under 10 seconds (9.95 secs) in the Mexico Olympics 1968. Since then there have been numerous others to run the distance sub 10 seconds. The current world record holder, Jamaican Usain Bolt has done it in an incredible 9.58 secs. Bob Beamon’s 1968, 29 feet two and half inch long jump too was believed to be an unbreakable record. The record stood for 22 years, but Mike Powell came along and jumped 29 feet 4 and quarter inch. Unlike Sharmila’s lonely odyssey, these celebrated feats are in very competitive fields of human endeavours. Sharmila’s is also a very sad story, which we hope nobody would have to go through ever.
Leader Writer: Pradip Phanjoubam