Blue Night In Lungthulien

I listened to the villager’s tales of worries all for free. If I had to pay them I’d go broke. They would be in the same situation if they had to pay me for listening. Like equals do everything was for free. There was plenty to listen. Too much for free. Initially it was difficult to even make out the head and tail of it. It looks like they have not been having anyone to listen to them. One by one they unwrapped them. Many of them were smeared with complain and helplessness. With bursting temper and uncontrolled emotions. The closer one gets to them, the intimacy instill a trust to share the visible as well as the unseen baggage that gnaws them, no matter what it holds. There was almost everything in listening. I said to myself man has not sought enough in listening.

I remember the first time I visited Lungthulien. It is still so clear. Like yesterday’s funeral. That was in February 2006; when the villagers were living in terror, girls and women raped, men folks herded and beaten, and the villagers getting displaced to refugee camp in Mizoram’s Sakawrdai . I met the shattered rape victims, their devastated parents, the helpless displaced persons and their desires to weave a new life. That was my first time in the village where I did the listening game.

Our kind host was Pu Ralkapthruom and his family. The same family hosted us during 2006. I had developed a home like feeling with the family. The shared misery bonded us for one thing. It has become so beautiful today. The relationship is like a beautiful flower on a plant of thorn. That thorn is necessary. It should be inevitable in this walk of life for every man. This time I and Lalthansang Pulamte were sheltered in the new house that glisten on a sunny day and glow on moonlit night. The old house sit above the National Highway 150 and the new one was situated on the opposite side. The new house was lifted high and done with a wooden floor. I love the balcony at the back of the house for every reason. That was one place I always resorted to, to listen when the fiery red sun set behind the distant blue Sinlung hills.

The view from the balcony was breath taking. The proposed Tipaimukh dam site stretches far and wide below. I was shown the areas that would be submerged if the dam is allowed to be built. From the balcony the bleak future of the dam could be seen. It touches part of our host land too. The present National Highway 150 would be submerged. Now there is a talk of diverting the highway. This must be one of the reasons why the road, which was a lifeline for the constituency, was not repaired and maintained for more than twenty years. This must be the reason why the Tipaimukh villagers were being slowly pushed into learning to live with the without. The without has a big shocking presence here. There’s nothing, not even a trace to say this is by the government and for the people. Sipuikawn and Tipaimukh villages would be submerged. Wipe off the map. Tuiruong (Tipaimukh), the river of life for thousands of villagers would flow no more for them. Fishing and the regular boat journey from Tipaimukh to Fulertawl and other areas in Cachar would be a thing of the past. The rice bowl, the jhum fields, of Rovakot , Sartuinek, Lungthulien, Parbung would be swelled with water. The forest and land of these villages are clearly visible from the balcony. On the other side, behind Tuiruong, sits Mizoram Sinlung Hills. The distant villages on the other side in Mizoram were electrified. Black tarred roads snake for them. AAY rice is available for Rs.3 a kilo. In Manipur’s Lungthulien, if it is available, the same rice cost Rs. 15 a kilo. Availability is a big question. The without could be felt. I sit and watched, as time pass by, reminding myself the great game of inequality that we are negotiating with silence and misery. What little was visible from that balcony was enough to knock everyone from the slumber that we are celebrating. We should not allow the bliss to go for long. The bliss should also have its limits.

The future is tense and grim if wrong decisions are taken from outside by the outsiders. We should not allow deliberated policies to uproot and destroy the lives and future of thousands of innocent villagers. We fail as human beings if our voices are silenced and our other strength becomes numb in the face of hungry forces driven by the might and power of money and heartless intruders. This is one of the most important corners where our history flourishes and the seed of our future is hatched. This land is precious. We are not fishes or other water friendly species to be dammed by doomed structures. We cannot surrender our land, rivers, homes, trees, forest, the land of our future generations and our priceless independence and dignity for vain monetary compensations. We won’t be man and human if we hope to eat money and survive. There won’t be any to eat even. The bait of inhumane seductions is pricking our conscience and reason. We all should stand up for this cause. There won’t be any other worthy cause that demands your intervention. There should be an alternative than wiping off a land and its people off the map in the name of development.

The magic of the night reveals as the moon glides from behind the mountain that wall Lungthulien. I listen to the sound of silence. I also hear children studying and reading aloud their homework in the quest of memorising them. There were playful voices too. It was all too different from the year 2006 when fear silenced the cosy village and the remainders were trapped without much choice. Today they are living like free men and women, but burdened with the threat of famine and epidemic deaths. More than five infants have died from the village, levelled by the “strange disease.” The running hills below us shone with surreal lights. It was like witnessing the greatest show of light that would never be repeated again. I blessed myself saying, “Only the blessed see this light.” Night insects and other unseen creatures lend their voices to the night. Some lend their lights too. I wonder if man has ever tried the sound anywhere. I sat glued and speechless. My friend, Lalthansang entered with an exclamation, “An hawi chuoi chuoi de aw!” We have been receiving gifts from the villagers- tea leaves, fruits, sometimes vegetables and meat too. “Tonight” he said, “It is a holy water that could burn with blue flame.” He performed that for me. I saw for the first time holy water up in flame. The holy water that never flows. We let it flow and the night explodes with the holy water up in blue flames.

(New Delhi, June 22, 2008)