“His Highness the Maharaja of Manipur hereby cedes to the Dominion Government full and exclusive authority, jurisdiction and powers for and in relation to the governance of the state and agrees to transfer the State to the Dominion Government on the fifteenth day of October 1949. As from the said day the Dominion Government will be competent to exercise the said powers, authority and jurisdiction in such manner and through such agency as it may think fit”
This was the first Article included in the document signed by then Maharaja of Manipur. But the rest of the document, or the rest of the articles, which are more like a consolatory provision, appears to be rather childish. Those are like candy deals. If it should appear in a poetry, then it could go like this;
O Great King
Your throne shall be gilded with gold,
So that you can sit beside.
Thy crown shall be re-casted,
For the new one must be unfit for thy head. [Article 2]
I shall offer you sweets,
In return you offer me your mouth.
You can hover around freely,
But you cannot pass the doors. [Article 3 & 4]
Priorities will be given to you and your family,
So long as you prioritize us. [Article 5,6,7]
We all know that His Highness never agreed to such childish quid pro quo. But unfortunately, some people have lived their lives so fabulously that they failed to detox themselves from such deals. When habits become second nature, people also failed to realise that things are going reflexively and not rationally. On the other hand, the other side, too, has never found the cure for themselves to avoid such irrational offerings and deals. Now this infectious ailment tends to spread across all domains. The bitter truth that remains blind to the masses becomes malignant, and when they realize the truth, it is always too late to understand that it is even an ailment. The only truth that the masses finally realize is ‘it is too late’.
However, if someone kidnapped a wife, the husband of these days felt that a quid pro quo is always fair. So, he waits for the deal to rescue his wife. The sense of injustice that one must immediately feel in the very act of kidnapping, that is spontaneous in nature, ceases to exists. Rather the sense of injustice surfaces only when the price of the exchange is offered, and he felt that the deal was unfair considering the improper balances. This is the current socio-political scenario prevailing among the confused nations and its inhabitants.
These days, people crave for roadside plots, not because it privileges the business opportunity, but because he can exercise the active protest called blockade to proceed with a quid pro quo, and hence the fulfilment of the desire or demand. People’s awareness is not with rightness or wrongness of his deed, but with the amount of ransom he demands. A corrupt official becomes a villain only when he raises the selling price, and not because he corrupts. A mafia is a hero as long as he donates a substantial amount to the trusts, and other charitable firms. A drunkard is a good and peaceful husband as long as he is productive, submissive, and lenient.
Though people have experiences of lessons that one begets from the darker history, one never learns the moral of the story. Six decades of rigorous education and literacy programs have never succeeded in making the people to realise the basic tenets of ‘justice in disguise’. Most people, these days, those who intends to resume in power, is acutely inclined to the thought John Locke has projected. He writes;
“I would turn merchant upon the prince’s command, because in case I should have ill success in trade, he is abundantly able to make up my loss some other way. If it be true, as he pretends, that he desires I should thrive and grow rich, he can set me up again when unsuccessful voyages have broke me. But this is not the case in the things that regard the life to come. If there I take a wrong course, if in that respect I am once undone, it is not in the magistrate’s power to repair my loss, to ease my suffering, or to restore me in any measure, much less entirely, to a good estate” [Letter concerning Toleration by John Locke].
The writer is Assistant Professor, Imphal College
