Open letter to Google

An Open Letter to Google

After having waited for more than three years for Google to update the Google Earth and Google Map satellite imageries for my State of Manipur (lying between N 25.749403° E 93.000779° and N 23.841493° E 94.750390°), I am writing an Open Letter to Google to request that the Satellite Imageries for Manipur be updated. Google Earth and Google Map imageries are the only GIS tools freely and openly available and accessible to the public, students and enthusiast of Manipur. While the major towns and heavily populated areas have been available for years (for which we are very grateful to Google) the rest of Manipur especially the hilly and moutainous areas have not yet been covered in detail.

My Open Letters have been prompted by a visit to a village called "Yang Khullen" ('Yang' means Roof or backbone and 'Khullen' means 'Old Village' in our language) in the mountainous area of Manipur. I have enclosed a few photographs I have taken of the village. The Photographs speaks for themselves. And another village is "Willong".

So, it is my sincere request that the imageries in Google Earth and Google Maps be updated. And it is my fondest hope that my request will be fulfilled before our Meitei (Native of Manipur) New Year which fall on 13th April every year.

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Bid to end insurgency in Manipur

The controversial Director General of Manipur Police, Y. Joykumar has claimed that the insurgent groups of Manipur are "devoid of ideology". He claimed that the UG groups have diverted from their true revolutionart ideology and have turned to extortion of money from the public and government. He made the statements in a meeting with the National media persons today in his office.

The DGP's statements are in line with the Government's policy to isolate the UG groups from the general populace's support. His statements has huge implications. The statements made by the DGP implies that the revolutionary groups of Manipur has no more cause other than extorting money from the public for their own monetary gains. This statement is true for many underground armed organisations in the state.

The people of Manipur has lose faith in some of these UG groups especially those factionalised and actively engaging in extortion from the public. On the other hand the people have also lose faith in the role of the Manipur Police and the Government Armed Forces as a protector of law and order.

The situation in this state has reached that state where the common people is fed up of both side of the warring party. If only it is possible, the people wishes both the warring groups to take their fight somewhere else and leave them alone.

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Victim’s family overjoyed by NHRC verdict

Following the recent directive of the National Human Right Commission (NHRC) to the Manipur government to pay monetary relief to the kin of late RK. Sanajaoba, who was killed in a "fake encounter" in broad day light on October 20, 2004, at Waheng Leikai, family members of the deceased expressed their happiness at the verdict of the NHRC and Asian Centre for Human Rights (ACHR) for its initiative in establishing the innocence of the deceased.




In a press meet today at the Manipur Press Club, mediapersons were briefed by the family members of the deceased and Y. Kapur, human right activist.




RK. Subharani, the victims' wife, expressed her contentment over the initiative taken by the NHRC and ACHR for bringing out the fact and further expressed her appreciation adding the compensation however will not be able to fill the gap left by her husband - the vacuum left by the violent and unnatural departure of a father and husband.




According to RK. Sorojini, the victims' mother, although her son was proven innocent by the NHRC, she would not be satisfied until all culprits involved in the incident are given befitting punishment as per law and appealed to the general public to extend cooperation in bringing justice.




The victim is survived by three children and a wife.




Y. Kapur revealed that the deputy registrar law of the NHRC, Sunil Arora, in a written statement, has on January 28, 2010, directed the Manipur chief secretary to pay Rs 5 lakhs as compensation within five weeks to next to kin of RK Sanajaoba and also asked for submitting necessary reports for the same within six weeks.




Y. Kapur further said that it was very unfortunate that the security forces from time to time has been violating Human Rights by manipulating the case to justify their misdeed and the same manipulation was also done in the case of Sanajaoba as the police in their charge sheet mentioned that he was shot for trying to snatched weapons from the police.




Further, the human rights activist asserted that people of Manipur are easily duped by security forces or by government due to the lack of awareness on Human Rights Education amongst the people and such manipulation can only be avoided if the concerned education departments emparted Human Right education in every institutions both in the schools or colleges.




Kapur also informed that a writ petition with regards to Sanajoaba's death with case number 506/06 has been filed at the Gauhati High court, Imphal bench, which is still pending and expressed hope that he expecting a positive development with the move of the NHRC.

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Prabhakara's parting shot

by Iboyaima Laithangbam




So M.S. Prabhakara, has eventually left the North Eastern region for good. It must have been an excruciatingly painful moment for him who had spent over 42 years of his life in the region. It was on the day of his departure from Guwahati that I read his article in The Hindu which was published three days earlier. My attention had been drawn to this article by a general discussion in a stag party. I made a point to skim read the article. I did not think it proper to read a friend's write up with mistrust, suspicion and with the objective of finding loopholes and infractions.




From the general discussion and my cursory reading of the article two points struck me. What is more I had a single line discussion on it with Prabhakara himself while his taxi had revved up engine for dropping him at the airport. His article gave me the impression that the merger of Manipur to the independent India on October 15, 1949 was preceded by the presence of the political agents, etc in Manipur and it means, so I had gathered, Manipur was not a an independent kingdom in the real sense of the term. On this issue Prabhakara said that people in Manipur are saying it. I am sure he must have interacted with persons who want that Manipur had been a part of India from the very beginning. It does not come as a complete surprise to me since many psuedo scholars maintain that the Manipuris are Aryans simply because Arjuna had married Chittangrada said to be a princess of Manipur. Nothing is known about her or some others with Sanskritised names. There is well founded contention that these men and women were invented by those persons who want to convert the Manipuris to Aryans. Manipur of those days was in Orissa and our kingdom was known as Manipur only after the advent of Vaishnavism in the 18th century. Secondly, how come we became Aryans simply because Arjuna, for argument's sake let us concede it, had married a girl supposed to be princess of Manipur. They were not Adam and Eve. If a Sikh marries a Manipuri girl now will all of us become Sikhs ? Because at the time of Arjuna's supposed marriage Manipur had a well established society. The persons already there could not have been their descedents.




After the 1891 conquest Manipur was brought under the British rule. The presence of a political agent whose nature of works is somewhat akin to the present day ambassador could not mean that Manipur was under the British rule. It is hazardous to take points in some books as gospel truths. One students' organisation had banned a text book as it said that Arjuna had come to Manipur and that we are Aryans. Another person had written a book which has a chaper on the merger ceremony at Shillong. An official who was personally present in the ceremony had in his book pointed out some discrepancies in the dramatis personae of the ceremony. In one article I had suggested to the person to make corrigendum since it concerns history and our posterity. Rather unfortunately the person has refused to do so. In other words the posterity will be confused since there are two different accounts of the merger ceremony.


If the October 15, 1949 merger agreement was not necessary in the real sense of the term a pertinent question may be asked as to whether the independent India would have undergone the rigmarole and drudgery of preparing the merger agreement, keep the Manipur's titular king under house arrest at Shillong for armstwisting him to sign on the dotted lines ? Besides he was merely a titular head who could do nothing without the approval of the elected body. Anti-merger persons say that as the merger was never discussed or approved by the elected body the document signed by the titular head is null and void and as such the merger is untenable.




If we accept the oversimplifcation of the rather complex legal and constitutional dimesions of the merger issue, by inference, we are telling the extremists that their armed movement for independence has no basis. But the fact is that Manipur's armed movement of different genre. The extremist leaders say that they are not demanding ceding of Manipur from India but merely restoration of independence which was wrested. Whatever may have been the relations of Manipur with the British Indian government before India's independence it should not be forgotten that the Britishers had restored independence to all princely states before their departure.




Prabhakara's parting shot might have opened the pandora's box. I hope he regularly surfs the website of the IFP.

-This article is courtesy of the Imphal Free Press.

PULF suspect gunned down, two earlier slain UGs identified

One suspected cadre of the underground PULF was gunned down by troops of the 28 Assam Rifles at Kiyamgei Muslim Takok Palli under Irilbung police station this evening around 8.15 pm during an encounter. One AK-56-Rifles loaded with one magazine and nine live rounds and some incriminating documents of the outfit were recovered from the possession of the deceased.

According to an official release, the incident occurred when troops of 28 Assam Rifles based on intelligence of presence of the armed militants in and around the Kiyamgei areas this evening, rushed to the area and conducted a swift operation.

During the course of the operation, some unidentified armed persons who have been taking shelter initially fired upon security forces and the security forces too retaliated., the release said

An encounter ensued on both sides for about 10 minutes and some armed person were seen escaping from the area while firing towards the security forces, it said.

The release further mentioned that personnel of the 28 Assam Rifles carried out search into the encounter site during which one unidentified person suspected to be amongst the armed militant was found dead along with one AK-56 Rifles containing a magazine along with nine live rounds.

The unidentified armed militants suspected to a cadre of underground PULF was picked up by Irilbung Police from the spot this evening and brought to RIMS morgue.

In the meantime, the identities of two suspected militants who were gunned down by a team of Imphal east police commandos yesterday at Irilbung were confirmed to be hard-core cadres of the underground UPPK.

The deceased were identified as Takhellambam Herojit alias Nanao alias Sailesh, 22, son of T Krishnakumar of Serou Mayai Laikai and Irom Naobiton alias Manglemba, 25, son of Ibocha of Lamshang Taothong Ayungba Maning Leikai.

It may mentioned that both the militants were killed during a fierce encounter yesterday afternoon around 1.45 pm at Lairouching-gol Tasar Farm under Irilbung PS.

According to the family sources, deceased Herojit never returned home since he joined PREPAK during 1994 and the deceased Naobiton alias Manglemba was reportedly too joined the same outfit eight years back.

Family sources further revealed that both the deceased were holding high rank in the outfit.

The dead bodies of two militants were handed over to their respective families by the police this afternoon after post mortem at RIMS morgue this afternoon.