Don’t know if the ongoing economic blockade will convince the State Government not to declare Sadar Hills and Jiribam as full fledged districts. What however is clear is that the blockade has sent prices of all essential commodities sky rocketing. So while petrol is being sold anywhere between Rs 200 and Rs 300 per litre in the black market, potato is being sold at above Rs 30 per kg. A kg of onion is now being sold at above Rs 60 per kg while a filled LPG cylinder is being sold at above Rs 2200 in the black. How about life saving drugs ? Or say anti-BP drugs and those on medicines to control diabetes ? As the Committee for Joint Naga Civil Societies, Delhi put it, the United Naga Council is not a criminal organisation. Everyone will agree with this observation, but then the present economic blockade it has imposed definitely borders on the criminal. This is a point which should be acknowledged by all. How else does one explain the extreme difficulties the common people are being forced to face ? There is no indication that the blockade will be rolled back any moment and this is what is worrying. And it is not only the lack of essential commodities that is worrying but the seeds of divide that have been sown. The official reason for the blockade is against any design of the State Government to grant district status to Sadar Hills and Jiribam, but in many ways, it has been interpreted as being imposed against the people, the people who have settled in the valley area and this is what is worrying. The counter blockade that has been imposed at different places in the valley area should explain this point.
The UNC has already made its stand clear and prolonging the suffering of the common people certainly does not make any sense. Its strong stand against granting district status to Sadar Hills and Jiribam has been made known and it would be in the fitness of things to take its protest or stand to a different plane. For too long the people have been made to suffer on the Sadar Hills issue. Remember the more than 100 days blockade in 2011 when the Sadar Hills District Demand Committee imposed the blockade to press home the demand that Sadar Hills be upgraded to the status of a district. So either way it has been the people who have always been at the receiving end of this contentious issue. It is here the State Government may also be questioned on why it is pussy footing the issue. The massive mandate the Congress received in the 2012 Assembly election has been rendered meaningless. Time for the State Government to take some tough decisions. It is also apparent that Delhi will not step in anytime soon, citing one technical reason or the other and this where the State needs as many lifelines as possible. At the moment the State Government has turned its eyes to the Imphal-Jiribam highway and it is a pity that attention is paid to this stretch along when the State is under siege. Roll back the blockade. The people have suffered enough.
Source: The Sangai Express
