Tragic though it was, the most positive way of looking at the recent earthquake is to see it as a wakeup call. Thankfully, the devastation was not as bad as it could have been. But this does not mean the place has been spared, as many believers in a supernatural order are prone to think. In fact, there should be no such words in the lexicon to describe the earthquake dangers the region is exposed to. Whatever we do, there is no way we can escape the fate that this region we call home is sitting atop a geo tectonic fault line, and earthquakes will be our destiny for almost as long as we can imagine. In real terms, it will be at least another couple of million years before the causes of these periodic deathly tremors are resolved. Scientist tell us that there are huge blocks of the earth’s crusts (tectonic plates) floating and moving and sometimes colliding or sliding against each other. One such collision between the Eurasian plate and the Indian plate about 50 million years ago between, caused the mighty Himalaya to rise, and it is the aftermath of this collision that those of us in the Himalayan region are still experiencing in the form of earthquakes, as the two plates slide against each other.
Although there can be no accurate prediction of earthquakes, the general conclusion that these tectonic plates do exist is undeniable. Scientists would have many evidences to show this, but one simple lay observation should leave even the sceptics amongst us convinced. Had these tectonic collisions been a fiction, there would be no way to explain the existence of mountains. For if there had been no energy from these collisions pushing the earth’s crust upwards, gravity and erosion would have ensured that the earth’s surface is smooth in the 4.5 billion years it came into being. Tectonic movements and collisions provide this answer. This is almost like the manner scientists now ponder in amusement that the existence of gravity itself should have been common sense with no need for Newton to discover it. If there had been no force pulling it down, the fabled apple that fell off the tree and on the scientist’s head could have also flown away in any other direction. It is also again almost like the manner scientists now realise the Big Bang should have become obvious after Newton’s discovery of gravity, for if everything in the Universe was attracting each other, the Universe should have collapse into a single point long ago. The obvious presumption then should have been, the Universe has not collapsed into a point because there was a counterforce greater than gravity, and this counterforce could only have come from an original explosion or Big Bang. Indeed, the Big Bang theory was a consequence of scientists trying to explain observations by astronomer Edwin Hubble that all heavenly bodies appeared to be moving away from each other and that the farther they were from each other, the faster they seemed to be moving away from each other. Though Bill Bryson is no great scientist himself, he is a good chronicler of the history of science, and his bestselling book, “A Short History of Nearly Everything” is an eye opener for lay readers like most of us.
To return to the original point this editorial started off with, since there can be no dispute Manipur will have to live through many more earthquakes in the future, the government must begin taking measures to meet this onerous challenge. It could begin first of all by ending the corrupt contract culture, which is nothing less than organised robbery of public funds by those in power and their cronies and brokers. As in all businesses, there is a legitimate profit margin contractors should earn from the jobs they are contracted to do, but this should not be about siphoning off 50 percent or more of the budget reserved for these jobs as is the practice in Manipur today. All government constructions must be ensured to be as per specification, and it is everybody’s knowledge this has seldom been. That the recent floods and then earthquake damaged public buildings most are proofs enough. But it is not just public constructions which the government must monitor. It must also come up with guidelines and strictures on how private homes are built in the state. In the past, when everybody lived a subsistent life, homes were built of light material, either baked mud or wood or bamboo thatch, therefore earthquakes were of much less threat to lives. Today, concrete structures dominate, but not always built to absorb earthquake trauma. The government should commission a study to find out which types of houses suffered most damages in the recent earthquake, and have its legions of engineers come up with construction methods that ensure safety as well as suit different budgets.