The prevailing chaos in Manipur today, especially ahead of elections, would make anybody rethink the notion of individual liberty upon which the very concept of democracy is based. Democracy`™s ultimate sovereign must remain the individual voter, and the aggregate of the will of the individuals in a given society is what is sought to be determined in any democratic election. So when this freedom is put under shackles, as is overtly happening ahead of the current rounds of ADC elections, democracy can have little meaning. Furthermore, what has also become urgently essential is to take a relook at the notion of the `State` and its relation to individual freedom. This would also imply a re-examination of the very understanding of `freedom`. Is it a standalone value, or must be come predicated to the `State`. In this connection, an episode from the 1970s Hollywood classic, `The Ten Commandments`, rescreened periodically on 24-hour movie TV channels such as the HBO is interesting. After his encounter God manifested as the `Burning Bush`, on Mt Sinai, Moses (Charlton Heston) returns with the inscribed `Ten Commandments` stone tablets to his people, recently freed from slavery under the Pharaoh of Egypt, and finds them revelling, idol worshiping and indulging in other gross hedonistic pursuits. When Moses tells them of the `Ten Commandments`, there were near riots. One among the crowd shouts back at him objecting to the new edicts of the Ten Commandments: `We want freedom`. Moses`™ answer to the man is remarkable: `There can be no freedom without the law` he shouts back.
This single sentence could arguably be the most profound defence, validation and vindication of the `State`. Without the `State` institution, and the `order` that its `laws` establish, all notions of individual liberty and rights would predictably acquire a different meaning, if not cease to have meaning altogether. So in the event of the authority of the `State` withering away, the result is not freedom as many presume, but lawlessness and anarchy. Those of us in Manipur probably would not find this difficult to understand. We live in a condition in which the State has withdrawn its legitimate authority, and everybody virtually has become the law. This is an argument for the `State` in these times of anarchy when so many are given to talking of the `State` as something dispensable. Clearly, we cannot allow it to wither away just as yet, if at all. The `State` and its instruments are still vital, although with good moderations. For the `State` and its instruments can get overbearingly authoritarian, as any unchecked power can, and hence one of the chief functions of the democratic polity is to check this tendency of a centralized power structure from becoming corrupt and authoritarian. This is done by making the authority of the `State` subject to periodic renewal of the mandate of democracy`™s ultimate sovereigns `“ the individual voters. Many of our ongoing debates on issues that impact our lives, including that of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, AFSPA, must be places in this discursive space, so as not to lose perspective.
This renewal process of `State` authority is what is coming under attack yet again on the eve of the elections to the Autonomous District Council, barely a week from today. The freedom with which the voters are expected to exercise their franchise is being violently strangulated by those who scheme to usurp `State` authority. And the tragedy is the `State` and its instruments do not seem to be showing up in all the ways it is expected to, apart from a show of arms it will put up on the day of polling. For between the polling day and the campaign process, a lot that is far from desirable has happened, including, to say the least, intimidation of candidates and their supporters by various vested interests. It is with dismay we note the `State` in Manipur is withering away, not in the Marxist sense where its authority is ultimately and totally transferred to the people (dictatorship of the proletariat) but in the sense of a collapse of its moral hold over the people. And behold we are witnessing the anarchy that only such moral collapses of the State can bring.
Leader Writer: Pradip Phanjoubam