I had this insight into Bobbie sands but best stick to syriac eh

A comparison between the British and Indian responses to insurgency: A Reflection on an Irom Sharmila Chanu Herstory

If I were Irom Sharmila's Headmaster and you were to ask me on her leaving day for my opinion of her, after collecting myself, "Irom, Irom you say, sounds familiar let me check. Ah below average intelligence, poor academic standards, never learnt to apply herself, will never amount to much. But on the plus side, a pretty young thing, very docile, unlikely ever to give anyone any trouble." Today of course the same HM would say, "Irom Sharmila Chanu the nation's greatest poetess, fearless experimenter in Truth, internationally feted peace activist, a Yogin with a radical vision for eco-friendly village based development opposed to western capitalism, I am sure she will be the first to accept that I taught her everything she knew."

So back to the British. If you were to ask a Britisher are you not ashamed, does not your nation harbour a terrible toxic guilt over it's treatment of the Irish. They might ponder for a moment, wondering what on earth are you on about. Images of boybands, girlbands, Enya, the Eurovision song contest, and then perhaps tourist stag dos held in Dublin where the stags can really go wild, or is the foreigner trying to say something about what we did to Guinness. Then he'd think well I don't mind discussing the facts in a reasonable manner but this foreigner does not seem to have a grasp of the basics of history. He'd be right. For is not History a coiled dragon which whilst sleeping devours its tail. Or perhaps the tail devours the dragon for history has no beginning no end. We enter and leave her always in medias res.

The island of Ireland, Eire in the tongue of the aboriginals, was made up of many tribal kingdoms under a mythic High King of All Ireland. In modern times the kingdoms were named as the Four Counties. When these Counties are united the fifth Royal County appears, where lives still the true High King of All Ireland. However since the British kept Ulster for itself and until it is returned the High King sleeps in his holy mountain. The Irish are a simple pagan people, highly superstitious, nominally Christian, and they are far from a united people. They would object to the tag of nominal Christian. On closer inspection there they are divided strictly upon economic and social and religious lines formed of dichotomous groupings such as travellers and settled, agricultural and IT workers, Catholics and Protestants, who prefer an apartheid based existence.

Manipur was a princely state one of the North Eastern princely states. If I were to ask people about the national shame heaped upon India by its treatment of these forgotten lands the Indian would retort as the Britisher though outwith mention of boybands and Guinness. As it is clear where I wish to go with this.

When I was in Bristol in the 1980s as a non-Englishmen I befriended many of the other nationals living in the Hostel there, the Welsh, Scots and Irish. One in particular a deeply religious young man had become increasingly irritated at being called an IRA supporter. He did not condone violence but whenever he spoke out at what the British were doing in his country people didn't even want to listen. I told him best not to speak when the English were about. He told me one tale I still remember more by the passion of the telling. How one of his schoolfriends was picked up one day by a British Patrol and beaten and kicked to the extent of leaving him hospitalized then and impotent for the rest of his life. No British soldier has ever been punished for any wrong doing in Ireland. He mentioned Bloody Sunday too the day British Paratroopers opened fire upon unarmed civilian peace protestors for which there have been countless Public Inquiries over the years, each Inquiry seems to leave just more unanswered questions and no one held to account. You don't know what it's like Desmond. You didn't grow up in Divers Flats (a Catholic housing estate in Belfast, Northern Ireland).

When I was in Dublin in 2000-2001 after the peace process was in full flow I was quite shocked by the reaction of one young Belfast Catholic woman on our course in Spirituality and Theology. I have a knack for getting under people's skin but it was her visceral anger. I don't recall the specifics save for her final comments. This is not about forgiveness. This is about justice. Only a mahatma it would appear can trascend the twisted knots of abuse and evil and still salute Namaskar in the other.

I will mention the Assam Rifles because they were formed by the British and there are parallels with the Black and Tans paramilitaries used against the Irish in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Usually Soldiers can maintain discipline for 90 days. After that in prolonged conflict the brutality of war brutalizes our children. And we do well to reminds ourselves that frontline soldiers are always children first until we have no more young to send, then and only then are the men sent out. With the Black and Tans and the Assam Rifles, a different model is used. Here you take the delinquents, the rapists, thugs, muggers and murderers and instead of depositing them just on a island far far away as some radical prison reformists seek. You give them a uniform and lethal weapons. The idea being to suppress terrorist insurgency with a greater terror. There is no discipline to maintain but the recruitment rids your troubled lands of problem children who then can work usefully and with honour for their country. I use the term honour here in the same sense as honour killing, not in the 19th century Romantic tradition.

The national sport in Ireland is Irish Football. At their national stadium during a national final an armoured regiment of Black and Tans invaded the pitch. Why, because petty thugs are killjoys who take no pleasure in life save taking pleasure from life. What started the bloodbath? And this too is consistent and predictable given the type of paramilitaries involve. Instead of trembling and “bending the knee before insolent might,” one of the star players kicked the ball over a tank and ran past it, what is termed an Up and Under. They responded with machine gun fire. These were British troops acting with the full authority of the State within the then borders of the United Kingdom.

Let me end this section by acknowledging the widespread use of gang rape against the women civilians of Northern Ireland by all sides during what was always called the Troubles. It is easy to make mock of the litotes preferred by Indian English, Encounter, Eve-Teasing, Honour killing and easy to forget that murder is perpetuated in Language. But if you wanted the British to acknowledge what you mean you could not just mention the Troubles, you would have to say the word in the context of Norther Ireland, because the word itself is meaningless.

What would happen was that a gang of men masked men would turn up at your house and drag a woman into the street. She would be stripped gang raped, beaten then tarred and feather and left tied to a lampost like a dog. And people would be too scared even to cut her down once the men left until the British Patrols returned. The prophecy of Jim Calaghan then Home Secretary to an Irish Catholic leader was that they could bring troops in very quickly but getting them out would be a devil of a job rang true. The Israelites could have wandered in the desert and still had time to take their seats for the troops withdrawal from Ulster.

Even positive evil is not as obscene as that cast by the shadow of pure goodness. Originally the men would say the “tarring and feathering” was to discourage collaborators. Then collaboration could mean you were a waitress or bartender and served the wrong person a drink. Eventually it meant you had a hard day, perhaps people close to you had been hurt or killed and you wanted to kick back and wind down. They were masked men who knows who side they were on. And Women were created to bleed.

Can you play a game outwith knowing all the rules? Can you comment on current events outwith knowing all the relevant history? I haven’t mentioned the Corn Laws, or the Famine, the campaign for the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland, absent Landlords, Cromwell. Nobody likes badmouthing their own. An Indian Woman will proudly attack Indian men’s conduct over many issues affecting them until a foreigner enters the room. Perhaps there is more to fear in White neo-Colonial racism and exploitation than in the incestuous rape and murder of your own.

Manipur once was a proud independent princely state. An omphalos of fertile valley protected by nine Hills, one being especially sacred to Mother Earth. A paradigm of India its description sounds too beautiful not to be mere fairy tale. And what goes on sounds more frightening than the surreal nightmares of pychosis. As the British East India Company gradually began to forge together the disparate proud independent States we now refer to as the Republic of India it was necessary to curb their independence. Free men, Free women will not be ruled. During British rule new migrants came mainly Muslim, the divisions between the minority Hill tribes and the Majority Valley Tribe were encouraged. Too much can be made of this. Human beings are like crabs in a bucket. We would rather bring our neighbour down with us then let anyone escape to freedom. The heritage of colonialism was in part the gradual reduction of an independent economy to one designed to provide resources for a Colonial Empire far far away. After Independence the model was maintained by New Delhi possibly just through bureacratic inertia. Although Crores have been spent notionally on Development, and many have become multi-millionaires through it, the colonialization of Manipur begun under the British has been consummated under Indian Republic Rule.

I mention this solely as part background. Economics can be as complex as History if you so choose. In simple terms there is no self-sustaining economy. If you see a new house being built in Imphal it belongs either to an insurgent or an NGO. The three largest industries world-wide are the Arms Trade, Drugs and People Trafficking. Manipur does not appear to have any other industry aside from symbolic residual tokens. Apart from bogstandard terrorism spread by small arms and explosives, the other main curse of Manipur is the Drug culture. A statistical comparison among Vietnam Veterans may be relevant. While in active combat 85% of American Forces regularly used illegal drugs. On their return this figure dropped to about 5% in the minority who never fully recovered from their experiences.

Often Indians dismiss our problems as being just of poverty, something in which the whole world shares. As if by proving that we have ordinary human problems we can be absolved from responsibility. The role of women in Manipur and India is another of the great contradictions. All human society at one level is Matriarchal. Men tend to shout shoot and confuse movement with action, though sometimes in our defence action requires some movement. But if you want to change any family, community or society. A suggestion offered by Homer in his Oddyssey remains valid. First approach the woman who is most important in this land.

The indigenous religion of Manipur is what the Catholic Church calls Animist. The women practice a form of Shamanry, through dance and chanting. During the days of the Raj the regional King introduced Hindu Vaishnavism as the State approved Religion. A syncretic form is practised now with Christians prevalent among the Hill Tribes and Hindus and Shamanry in the Valley. The women have a tradition of their own family courts. They maintain a tradition of quiet brave satyagraha, not completely with ahimsa. The weaving staves are also often used as a weapon by the women though it seems to be more the effect of burly men being beaten back by a loaded handbag. All but the most hardened drug crazed rapists back down before someone who reminds them of their mother.

Thangjam Manorama Devi was raped tortured and murdered by officers of the 17th Assam Rifles on 11 July 2004. Their version is that they interrogated a suspect as was their right under the Armed Forces Special Provisions Act which operates in Manipur and the North Eastern States of India. In response twelve Meira Paibi (women elders) stripped in front of Kangla Fort until recently the barracks of the Assam Rifles chanting with dignity and outwith hatred to the brave soldiers of the Republic of India what I would fear to say. It’s a story which if I had read about 1st century apostles acting spirit filled speaking the gospel truth to those in authority fearless to the consequences I would assume that this was a later exaggerated redaction because human beings are not capable of such bravery.

And on a human level too I sympathize with a young business type trying to impress the equivalent of the Rotarian Club with his new business plan going into shock when instead of laughing at the ridiculousness of these local women he realizes that one of them is his mother. What were you thinking. I had to pretend I had no idea who you were and that this sort of thing never usually goes on around here we are a very civilized people. Oh and what’s for dinner I am starving. But she is an Indian Amma just released from prison on police bail charged with acts of public indecency. She has prepared his favourite dish for dinner. Did he really need to ask. If you want to know did the campaign work then you misunderstand me. The Meira Paibi responded in a non-violent protest and they will continue to respond non-violently until God hears the cry of Her people. I chose to compare the British and Indian treatment of insurgency to reassure Indians that I have not come to judge from a height. I am pleading on my knees.

There is a superficial comparison with the actions of Lady Godiva who rode through mediaeval coventry naked on horseback to shame her husband into withdrawing an unfair Poll Tax on the poor. But it seems to me the legend is lost now in Romanticism and a brand of luxury chocolates. There is something natural simple and womanly in these desperate noble and quiet acts of ordinary women, a way of reclaiming humanity and humanness in a world when daily we lose ourselves and forget who we are, who we are to become.

I will give a potted history of the AF(SP)A as it is the reason she whom my soul loveth suffers. In 1942 the world was at war with the original Axis powers of unmitigated Fascist Evil. If the Allies had lost that war then Indians would not have the luxury of complaining about what the British did or didn’t do. If there were any Indians left they would merely explain it all as the Yuga of Kali. When war first broke out 100,000 Anzac troops landed in Singapore as the first line of defence against Japan. Within two days they were given the choice of surrendering or being bombed to death so the British Commander gave the order for unconditional surrender. Burma borders Manipur and it was where the Japanese advance was eventually halted by the Indian Army. I will continue to call the nation Burma until the freeing of Aung San Suu Kyi. The current Government has no legitimacy even to change the country’s name.

Thus to quell insurgency in Manipur the British having founded the paramilitary force of the Assam Rifles declared emergency legislation which allowed for an officer of at least the rank of Captain having given a written order to allow his men to shoot to kill in order to maintain order. The written order meant someone could in theory be held to account. The current law and these types of laws are always brought in as temporary measures was passed in 1958 and allows any soldier to detain, arrest, question or kill suspected insurgents on the grounds of suspicion alone. I am not arguing that a sane healthy society does not from time to time produce laws like this against it’s own citizens. I am asking for the people of India to change this law so that Irom Sharmila Chanu can end her indefinite fast. Because the world needs more lights. We cannot keep murdering our prophets and prophetesses.

It was the senseless killings at Enniskillen that the Irish sickened of their madness and enemies finally came to the table. Nobody needs to plan for prosperity. The Irish brought their own once the guns were taken away, and the violence ended. There were peace protestors and often Women Groups who led the way. The British experimented with Internment in Ireland in the 1960s but they gave it up as counter-productive. They tried shorter periods of detention outwith trial but these were ruled illegal under Habeas Corpus rights. Only a few years ago the detention of suspected Muslim terrorists at HMP Belmarsh in London for then over two years outwith informing them of the offences against them on the grounds it would harm national security was ruled illegal by the House of Lords.

It was the murder of ten people in a bus queue in Malom that sealed Sharmila Chanu’s resolve. Just before terrorists exploded a bomb killing officers of the Assam Rifles. Since they didn't know who was responsible they decided to shoot the first people they came across, a modern version of an ancient fairy tale, whether of Jepthah's daughter or Beauty and the Beast.

Since 2 November 2000 Sharmila Chanu has been repeatedly arrested and detained under a mental health act on the grounds that she is attempting suicide. I am not clear why the Indian Government never charged Ghandi-ji with this particular law. That is a question Indian Government ministers can better answer for themselves. Since then she has been kept in quasi solitary confinement. The Indian State is clearly not evil nor is it deliberately pursuing evil for the joy of hurting and abusing its own people. They have on the statute books a draconian law that would shame any democracy where democratic values were held in esteem. They have a woman whom they don’t want to die while she is in their care who insists on Satyagraha.

Quite a quandary it would seem. The most intelligent and talented men and women in all India, many with multiple doctorates and yet they can see no way out of this paralysing dillemma. If they were to repeal the AF(SP)A then their security forces would be accountable if they raped and murdered their own citizens outwith any reason. I don’t wish to oversatyrize what many Indians probably unfairly believe of their own security forces and police but the AF(SP)A doesn’t exist in most of the country but this has never stopped anyone from raping and murdering a tribal if they really wish to do so. Quite a difficult thorny enigma then, and I hope I have not belittled the quandary that the men and women who govern the largest democracy in the world have to consider.

Yet if I have assuaged the need for critical comment. Have you not been entertained as the Gladiator put it. May I respectfully suggest that the problem is not as insurmountable as our Politicians would have it. On 2 November 2000, Irom Sharmila touched the foot of her mother and asked her permission to follow her bounden duty as far as she had been given light to see. With the permission of her mother and her immediate family members granted she announced that she would begin an indefinite fast until the Armed Forces Special Provision Act was repealed. She had always been a thoughtful young woman. She had spent some time working for a UN field team investigating human rights abuses. She had begun then the daily practice of Yoga and was already used to fasting once a week as part of the Ayamas. Because she does not seek death, because she loves life, she consented to the painful procedure of force feeding. But she refuses to brush her teeth except with a cotton bud, to comb her hair or wear sandals. She reads voraciously but does not keep books. And she writes mystic poetry when she is full. When she is empty she rests in solitary confinement and practises her yogasanas. There is no point in asking an expert how much longer she might live. No one knew until she began her fast that anyone could survive this long even with force feeding via a nasal tube to her stomach. Her body has deteriorated but not as might have been predicted. She attributes her continued life to her daily yogasanas and western medicine offers no counter-theory for her survival.

There is an interesting parallel in the functioning of our autonomous functions and our security forces. When the body enters famine mode, the body starts to prioritize functions and consume what is not essential. In Sharmila Chanu's case among the more commonly reported consequences are Brittle bones and Amenorrhoea. My heart and soul have different priorities to my body. What it thinks is dispensable I would argue with if I had the choice. Just as with our Security forces. The Gospel of Christ has taught us that it is never better for one person to suffer than for the whole nation to perish.

In conversations with a priest friend he had said that a true prophet always inspires love, and brings life in more abundance. Rather than focus on the physical damage being waged as symbol in this woman’s body it struck me that she does inspire. I have no doubt that she will not die under hunger strike even though there is no evidence that anything will change in Manipur or New Delhi. I also am fascinated waiting to see how she will bring about changes economic and social, bring true peace to Manipur. And not alone as part of the Meira Paibi tradition, those women who carried torches as the nightwatch and would shame their men into living better lives. And I know that the problems of Manipur will not be solved by visiting NGOs. They clearly seem to thrive on the problems. It is impossible to do justice to the herstory of Irom Sharmila Chanu, in English that would translate to something like Lady Sharmila Irom but translation is fraught even for one who boasts that he is a budding Syriac Scholar. Writing unlike life is about re-writing re-phrasing until the imperfections no longer detract from the story that wants to be written. Writing unlike life is always a rehearsal. For now you may write to her directly at: Irom Sharmila Chanu Security WardJawaharlal Nehru HospitalPorompat Imphal – 795001Manipur.

There is one remaining parallel to consider from the British involvement with insurgents. In the 1970s IRA prisoners went on an indefinite hunger strike in order to secure political prisoner status. Bobbie Sands a convicted murderer, stood for election in a Catholic Constituency of Northern Ireland while on Hunger Strike and was elected by the will of the people. There are comparisons I draw reluctantly. Thatcher's government was advised force feeding the prisoners especially if they resisted and needed to be strapped down would amount to cruel and inhuman punishment and possibly a crime against humanity. The IRA prisoners wanted their rapists, their murderers, their punishment squads to be redefined as political prisoners. I still believe that they were entitled to their political beliefs, but a cake is a cake whichever way you slice it. I hope you do not find me guilty of hypocrisy in this.

Irom Sharmila Chanu has sacrificed nine year of fasting one for each of the nine hills guarding Manipur. She gives daily permission to nasal tube feeding if she declines permission the feeding will stop and she will die. If she were to stand for the next available election as an MLA for Manipur could she not then continue to symbolize the struggle for freedom in Manipur in her body in hope and resurrection. It would be impossible to predict her. As was once said of a maverick British Officer his men would follow him anywhere, if only out of curiosity. She used to ride her bicycle and listen to the plaints of her people. As an MLA she could do so again and represent the voiceless.

I know both that even if we burn all earth's flowers that the Spring shall still come. And I know that our Redeemer liveth and will raise us up before the end. But she, my ghost sister, the sleeping beauty of the northern states I know I cannot help I cannot save and I must. If only she were not a woman she might be easier to persuade.

She is on collision course towards a rock, and perhaps I am suggesting only that she make a course correction towards an iceburg. For now Manipur has only symbols. In the Name of the Christ of God whom we love and serve, will you not join with me in asking her now for a symbol of hope and new life.