lrom Sharmila - Indian Aung Saan Suu Kyi

Irom Chanu Sharmila (born March 14, 1972), also known as the "Iron Lady of Manipur" or "Menghaobi" ("the fair one") is a civil rights activist, political activist, and poet from the Indian state of Manipur. Since 2 November 2000, she has been on hunger strike to demand that the Indian government repeal the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 (AFSPA), which she blames for violence in Manipur and other parts of India's northeast. Having refused food and water for more than ten years, she has been called "The world's longest hunger striker"

           She is a living story of peace, non-violence, resistance. Her strength is unmatched, her determination strong. She has decided to singlehandedly take on the mighty Indian State. Suffering in solitude on a hospital bed in Manipur, she refuses to eat. She even cleans her teeth with dry cotton ensuring not even a drop of water escapes inside her body. She is on an indefinite fast for more than a decade now. Last week, she was released from judicial custody on completion of her one year imprisonment (for trying to commit suicide), but rearrested as she continued her fast-unto-death. Forcibly fed lentil soup through a catheter attached to her nose, in perpetual imprisonment, somehow, they just can’t let her die.

The reason behind this fasting for a decade is AFSPA

The AFSPA was passed in 1958 by an act of Parliament. It conferred special powers upon armed forces in allegedly "disturbed areas" in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura. It was consequently extended to Jammu and Kashmir as The Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act, 1990 in July 1990. Hence, the security forces, in these areas, can… "Fire upon or otherwise use force, even to the causing of death, against any person who is acting in contravention of any law" or against "assembly of five or more persons..." It can arrest without a warrant and can also enter and search any premises to make arrests.

           

The darkest dimension is that it gives the security forces ‘legal immunity’ for their actions. There can be no prosecution, suit or any other legal proceeding against anyone acting under that law. Nor is the government's judgment on why an area is found to be "disturbed" subject to judicial review. No wonder, human rights activists, constitutional experts and democrats call this law “brazenly draconian and anti-people”.

With Irom Sharlima, AFSPA arrived as a vicious circle. It all started on the fated day of Thursday, November 2, 2000, when the notorious Assam Rifles indiscriminately and without provocation gunned down a group of 10 citizens at a bus stop in Malom in retaliation to an alleged attack on their convoy the same morning by unknown persons. Most of the killed were women and children. Irom Sharmila Chanu, who was then a 28-year-old young human rights activist, went up to her mother Sukhi Devi, sought her blessings and quickly decided to prolong her weekly Thursday fast. Thus arrived the starting point of the legendary fast-unto-death of an ordinary, young, almost apolitical Manipuri woman, who, until now, would cycle to meetings and the market, living a quiet and obscure life.

In the Northeastern state of Manipur and beyond, Irom Sharmila is an iconic figure. The people of Manipur refer to her as Menghaobi, the fair one. She has become the face of their alienation and resistance, their opposition to the arbitrary ways of the Indian State ruled by Delhi where innocent young men and women have been routinely killed and raped by sections of the Indian security forces. The Manorama Devi rape and encounter is still fresh in the minds of the women of Manipur. Then, in disgust and anger, the mothers of Manipur had come out of their homes, stripped naked outside the Assam Rifles headquarters in Imphal, and challenged the army to come and rape them: “Come Indian Army, Come, Rape Us,” said the banner held by the naked ‘mothers of Manipur’.

A poetess and a voracious reader, she spends her time reading and writing and likes to do her work herself. “I have to be strong. I have to fight,”

Born in the family of a class IV employee in 1972, Sharmila is the youngest among nine siblings. She was breast fed by other women for her mother was already dry when she was born. “Perhaps that is why she has grown so socially conscious and politically committed,”

“My spiritual fight for the sake of justice will definitely succeed... In this mundane world, living creatures are bound to die some day. So I don’t have any unnecessary fear for my life...,” she said in an interview. Hence she fasts, eternally. Fearless Irom, with iron in her soul.

My view: India being the world's second biggest democratic country and the country that has raised it collars as a peace oriented nation, why need such an act to control its own people. India who never went for a cross border military attack, the country that never started a war itself why they use it armed forces to kill and rape its own blood. When will Iron Sharmila's ten years fasting for a secured land will come to an end?

என்று தணியும் இந்த சுதந்திர தாகம்........

இரா. இராஜேஷ் குமார்

References:

The week leader: http://www.theweekendleader.com/Heroism/432/Daughter-of-Manipur.html

Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irom_Chanu_Sharmila

Google Images: http://www.google.com/search?q=irom+sharmila