With this much of negative public reflections floating around concerning the performance of the present Government, one has been wondering what happened to the Party in power from responding to some of it at least, apart from the ones raised by their opposition NPCC. It now seems apparent that they had been trying to harvest all the negative adjectives in the Dictionary to liberally fling at their detractors. Good for you NPF Kohima Division...after all everyone understands that you too have to earn your bread and butter, and it takes intelligence to know which side your bread is buttered.
Let me begin by regretfully saying I am not well read enough, not articulate enough nor possess good command over English enough to cause you real concern. I wish I had the confidence of your delusion. As for your statement of “a man disillusioned with his lot” how more accurate can you get? Yes “his lot” is definitely disillusioned with the problems being generated by “your lot”.
Asking for “documentary evidence”... “about NPF having purchased its way to power with the tacit blessing of NSCN(IM)” is absurd. I have yet to hear of a bribe giver insisting on a receipt from the bribe taker, and even if such receipts were to exist, asking for its production sounds sanctimoniously hypocritical because it would all be with them already...the people knows that. Beyond the documentary evidence however, the masses know that all the evidences you need are walking around in every Districts and villages in Nagaland because your kind were the givers and they were the takers. What more evidence do the NPF need? As a mind refresher you have walking evidences in your NPF crowd spearheaded by personalities like Mr. Imkong, Minister H&FW glorified on a high pedestal for all to see.....for that matter the public is fully aware how many crores of rupees each of the candidates across the board have spent. That the NPF outspent their oppositions to win the election does not require documentary evidence. For the NPF, an amount of Rs.1.10 crores is just a ‘chai pani’ worth perhaps but can NPF say with an honest clear conscience that such a significant amount being caught red handed in the hand of a contesting candidate was meant for anything else but to buy votes? And to think that this is not even the tip of the iceberg. If there are ‘buyers’ it goes without saying that there will be ‘sellers’. For heaven’s sake, who is NPF Kohima Division trying to fool asking for a documentary evidence?!
“Trying to incite his community to rise against the Chief Minister”, is an unfortunate view seen through the prism of a Party that I can hardly stop them from, but the focus was not for inciting communalism. The exalted Office of Chief Minister of Nagaland represents all Tribes of Nagaland...or does the NPF consider that it actually belongs to one particular Tribe or the other? For all right thinking people, the Chief Minister belongs to you, to me and everybody else...so how do you incite the community against your own? The issue was more to do with the failure to live up to the official responsibility. It was and is an official protocol responsibility for the Chief Minister to speak out when a incident like Mukalimi takes place just as he promptly did in the Karbi massacre case at Dimapur and the Arunachal boy Nido’s case at Delhi. Till this day, the Chief Minister has not uttered a single word, NOT A WORD in the public domain concerning Mukalimi. WHY? WHY? His silence amounts to a condonation of the misdeed. I repeat: His silence is a condonation of the molestation of the Sumi women by the NSCN(IM)! Is it because his Government lacks the spines to do the right honourable thing? or is it because of his indebtedness to NSCN(IM) for his Party’s survival, that has shut his mouth up? Either ways he has shied away from his official protocol responsibility to condemn this incident of molestation. No one would be stupid enough to say that the Chief Minister is personally responsible for the molestation of the Sumi women. On the other hand everyone does expect him to officially condemn this atrocity outright as a Chief Minister should. In as far as the events that followed, yes, I would still uphold my opinion that his Government is definitely responsible for the inept handling of the situation. A crime was committed. The Government’s elementary duty was to promptly arrest the culprits...not negotiate a settlement on behalf of the criminals through his Home Minister. This woeful mismanagement led to the escalation of events at Mukalimi culminating in the death of the Sumi youths. As compared to the Karbi or Nido’s case, the Chief Minister of Nagaland was all the more ‘protocol duty bound’ to official condemn the crime committed and condole the death of the Sumi youth caused through the Government’s mishandling of the situation. Apart from his official duty, people would have expected the Chief Minister to show a Christian compassion even as a social responsibility by offering a word of condolences to the bereaved fathers and mothers since this was no ordinary incident. Even this did not happen. The whole business of secretively paying the ex-gratia grant on a backdate is just as much distasteful. Pray tell us, why the secrecy?
My duty as a concerned responsible senior citizen is to do the best I can to place facts on the table. By doing so, I neither claim to be the “Spokesman of the Nagas” nor the “Advocate, judge and the hangman”. The people of Nagaland are. Keeping these backdrops in mind, now take a look at the pathetic question that the NPF Kohima Division has posed: (Quote): “His recent outburst against the Chief Minister in the general public meeting Chumukedima area on 13th February 2014 and calling the Chief Minister to condole or apologize to the Sumi Community as reported in Nagaland Post(front page) date 14th February 2014 makes the public wonder about the sanity of this person. Was the Chief Minister personally responsible for all events leading to the molestation and unfortunate loss of lives at Mukalimi?”(Unquote).
I do quite agree that “the public has a right to know about the actual response of the State Government vis-a-vis Mukalimi incident not in the form of information starved press communiqué but through a more elaborate explanation as to why the Honb’le Chief Minister of Nagaland has to date not uttered a word of official condemnation on the molestation case of the Sumi women by NSCN (IM)? Why has the Honb’le Chief Minister of Nagaland not found it in his heart to officially condole the death of the Sumi youths after the Mukalimi incident? These are some of the basic questions that need answers.
It quite understandable that when there is hatred in one’s heart, one is likely to get angry because the truth that others speak would contradict the lie one lives....and read everything as politically motivated. Unfortunately for the NPF Kohima Division, I do not belong to any political party and therefore in their book I am insane. I am content remaining insane rather than be identified with sane people like your crowd, so thank you for your compliment. All I can say is that there are more truths in the cupboard, and can be share on provocation.
Khekiye K. Sema IAS (Rtd)
Forest Colony, Kohima
