HIV/AIDS Prevalence Rate Alarming in Nagaland

Kohima, Nov 7 : The HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in Nagaland stands at an alarming 78 per cent.

This means 7 to 8 people out of every 1000 people are infected with the deadly virus compared to the national average where only 3 to 4 persons out of every 1000 people.

Dr Hutoka, Medical Officer in-charge of Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) Centre in District Hospital of Dimapur announced this during a sensitization programme on HIV/AIDS held at Signal Angami Basti yesterday. He put the number of people detected with the disease to 12,400 in the state.

He, however, said only 7,500 people had been registered as many people were yet to come forward for treatment despite already knowing their status. He said one of the reasons why the drug administered to the patients has less effect was the late arrival of the patients.

Dr Hutoka encouraged the people to come forward for blood testing and early treatment after detection of the disease. He said 70 patients came to ART Centre Dimapur last month of whom 48 came very late.

Dr. Hutoka said there were over 3,500 people infected with the disease in Dimapur as per record and that only 1,500 were undergoing treatment.

He said 127 people had died of the disease in Dimapur since the establishment of the Anti-Retroviral Therapy Centre at the District Hospital in 2006. Of the 127 deaths, majority of them were within the age group of 25 to 49 and only few were below 4 to 5 years.

He further informed that Post-exposure Prophylaxis (PEP) treatment was available 24 hours at the District Hospital Dimapur where any person who had been exposed to the disease could avail of the service free of cost.

In Manipur, Not Easy To Get Petrol Even For Rs 240/L

Manipur has only one-day fuel left: Govt

Imphal, Nov 7 : The Manipur government on Sunday did some tough talking, threatening that it would be left with no other options but to "use our means" to resolve the crisis arising out of the ongoing economic blockades.

"We will try to negotiate. (However, if problem persists), we have to use our means," Manipur chief minister O Ibobi Singh told journalists here.

The Sadar Hills District Demand Committee (SHDDC) imposed economic blockades on national highways 39 and 53 on August 1 demanding the creation of Sadar Hills district. Soon after, the United Naga Council (UNC), the apex Naga organisation of Manipur, enforced similar blockades on the same routes protesting the government's alleged attempts to bifurcate Naga-dominated areas for creation of the new district.

Last week, the SHDDC lifted its blockade following the government's assurances to look into its demand. But the UNC seems to be in no mood to lift it. The government could not break the ice even after several rounds of talks with it.

Ibobi said if the blockades continued, government would be left with little options. "We have to clear one of the two highways for our survival…We have to face any eventualities," he said. The chief minister said his government was considering bringing in a legislation to ban bandhs and blockades. "There are Supreme Court directives in this regard.
However, at the moment, we want to try and resolve the crisis through negotiations," he said.

The chief minister admitted that the present stock of essential commodities was 'not good'. "However, we are trying to improve the situation".

The state government was using national highway 53 to escort goods-laden trucks into the state once in a week. But to add to its woes, a major bridge in Assam collapsed recently snapping road communication leading to Manipur. "I have spoken to my Assam counterpart. We hope they will do the needful at the earliest," Ibobi said.

There is a short supply of essential commodities in the state following the blockades and the prices have also spiraled like never before.

Petrol and diesel now cost Rs 180-240 and Rs 80-100 a litre in the black market. An LPG cylinder costs about Rs 1,800 to 2,000. The locals say potato now costs Rs 30-40 and onion Rs 60 a kg. An egg costs Rs 10. In fact, there is an acute shortage of essential commodities.

"We want immediate regulation of the prices," says Abdul Haque of All Manipur Students' Union.

Manipur Under Relentless Siege

By Laishram Nandalal Singh

“The failure of the Union Government to resolve ethnic disputes in the North-East has resulted in crisis after crisis.

This is best exemplified by the ‘economic blockades’ imposed on Manipur and its hapless people. The moment one blockade ends, another begins as any promise made by the Government to one group leaves the other demanding for more. Meanwhile, the people suffer severe hardship and shortages ”

The economic blockade imposed by Sadar Hills Districthood Demand Committee has been lifted following a written assurance from the Government of Manipur that its demands will be fulfilled at the earliest. Normalcy, however, remains elusive as the United Naga Council and All Naga Students Association of Manipur have announced the intensification of the ongoing blockade which began in mid-August. Balancing the demands of these two organisations is what the Government of Manipur wanted to achieve but it did failed. The question now is: How is the Government going to engage with the anti-Sadar hills district groups while at the same time restoring peace in an ethnically fragile situation in Manipur? It is now clear that the Sadar Hills will become a full-fledged revenue district but only after the District Reorganisation Committee submits its report to the State Government.

The economic blockade on the two national highways — NH-52 and NH-37 — that link the North-Eastern State with the rest of the country has been a routine affair for long. In every instance of blockade on either of the highways or both, the organisation that imposes it holds 27 lakh people to ransom. Last year it was imposed by Naga outfits as a move against the autonomous district council election. This time it had been a twin blockade imposed by two groups — one demanding a Sadar Hills district and the other opposed to the demand. While the Manipur Government sits on the vexed issue wondering which road to take during the course of the 92-day ordeal, a sizeable section of the impoverished masses is on the verge of starvation. Unfortunately, New Delhi has remained a mute spectator to the severe hardship due to the twin blockades.

The other serious fallout of the blockade is the growing insecurity among the truck owners and drivers. The recent decision of Transporters and Drivers Council to cease all activities of assisting transportation of goods is another blow to the beleaguered State Government and the people reeling under the ‘artificial famine’. The council has embarked on the agitation after the State Government failed to decide on the compensation for trucks damaged during the blockade.

A quick look at the history of Sadar Hills will be of relevance here to understand the stakes. The Selected Area Development Administrative Region Hills is the region overlooking and encircling the Imphal valley. The Sadar subdivision was created for administrative convenience during the British rule in 1933 with its headquarters at Kangpokpi. With the signing of the ‘Merger Agreement’ with India on September 21, 1949 by Maharajah Bodhachandra Singh, Manipur became a ‘Part-C State’ of the Indian Union. In 1969 Manipur was divided into five districts: Central (Imphal), North (Karong), South (Churachandpur), East (Ukhrul) and West (Tamenglong). To fulfill the aspirations of the hill people the Government of India enacted the Manipur (Hill Areas) District Council Act, 1971. Section 3 of the Act divides the hill areas into six Autonomous District Councils or Hills Districts that includes the Sadar Hills.

The movement for upgradation of the Sadar Hills area of Senapati district into a full-fledged revenue district began in the early seventies. The present agitation is a cumulative effect of frustration and disaffection of the people in Sadar Hills with the Government in the last four decades. According to Sadar Hills Districthood Demand Committee, the delay in granting district status to Sadar Hills has denied them opportunities for all-round development. In the memorandum submitted to the Chief Minister of Manipur on July 26, SHDDC leaders estimated that an amount of Rupees 38,000 crore have been lost as revenue in the 40 years of delay in upgrading Sadar Hills to a revenue district. They lamented that such large amounts of money could have been spent on socio-economic developments in the Sadar Hills.

The demand for the creation of Sadar Hills district first came from the Kuki Chiefs’ Zonal Council in its meeting held on September 3, 1970. The leaders of Kuki Chiefs’ Zonal Council met then Home Minister KC Pant in July 1971 and placed their demand for a separate district comprising Sadar Hills. The Nayal Commission in 1974 not only recommended the creation of Sadar Hills as a full-fledged district, but also suggested the inclusion of some adjoining areas of Senapati and Ukhrul for administrative convenience and development. However, all these demands, talks and recommendations failed to produce any fruitful result.

Sadar Hills District Demand Committee was formed in 1974 to spearhead the agitation for a full-fledged revenue district status for the Sadar Hills Autonomous District Council, consisting of Saikul, Kangpokpi and Saitu subdivisions. Several State ministries attempted to declare Sadar Hills as a revenue district. In 1982, Rishang Keishing’s Congress government brought an ordinance before the Governor to declare Sadar Hills as a district. It was signed by the Governor but the ordinance was withdrawn due to opposition from the then Manipur Naga Council.

Succeeding Governments also made efforts to upgrade Sadar Hills into a revenue district, but without success. The election of new SHDDC leaders in June 2011 marked the revival of the movement. The Sadar Hills District Demand Committee has been renamed as Sadar Hills Districthood Demand Committee, and it now spearheads the present agitation.

The State Government has almost fallen in line under pressure from SHDDC and initiated steps for fulfilling the decades-old demand. It constituted a Committee for Reorganisation of Administrative and Police District Boundaries to study the formation of a new district and issued a notification on public hearing on September 15. However, the Nagas of Manipur, who have been opposing the Sadar Hill demand since it was first raised, launched a counter-agitation against the State Government’s move. The Nagas of Manipur claimed that they were the original settlers or the indigenous people while the Kukis who comprise the majority in Sadar Hills Areas as late settlers. To mount pressure on the State Government, the United Naga Council announced an economic blockade on the two national highways on August 21 of this year to counter the demands of the SHDDC. They reiterated that no Sadar Hills District could be created as a full-fledged revenue district in the absence of UNC representatives. The Nagas claimed Tamenglong, Senapati, Chandel and Ukhrul as their ancestral land based on folktales and oral traditions. They cited documents of British colonial gazetteers, reports and surveys to justify their claim.

However, the Kukis negated the claim saying that neither the Nagas nor Kukis had written historical records as they didn’t have a script of their own. In the absence of written history the claims on such myths are more of a speculation.” The Nagas in the Sadar Hills region staged a sit-in protest and held demonstrations and protest rallies against the formation of Sadar Hills district. They even vowed to shed blood for the cause of their land, saying the Nagas would not compromise over their land. In a letter to Union Minister for Home Affairs Minister P Chidambaram on September 14, the UNC argued that every Naga village and tribe has its own distinct territorial boundary and jurisdiction. The Nagas, the letter mentioned, had all along been fighting against the arbitrary bifurcation and division of “our land without our knowledge and consent”. UNC warned that the Manipur Government would be responsible for any untoward incident arising out of this issue.

Meanwhile, another perspective was revealed when the United Committee Manipur demanded that the district boundaries be appropriately surveyed and demarcated for the purpose of administrative conveniences and that the exercise should not pander to sectarian assertions on the basis of parochial ethnic and religious affinities.

According to reports, more than 10 Government offices were burnt and about the same number of vehicles torched during this agitation. Three women were also killed when a vehicle under attack hit them. Not a single police personnel or member of the central forces could be seen along the highway’s strike zone during the crisis. Blocking a highway is akin to violating the rights of people. The indifferent attitude of the Union Government on the frequent economic blockades on the two National Highways in Manipur will further enhance the disillusionment of the people in Manipur in particular and the North-East in general. Instead of giving lip service, the Union Home Minister could have been more proactive. No one is now sure whether the blockade that was recently called off by SHDDC will be the last from their side. In the same vein, none of us is convinced if the Naga group’s unfinished economic blockade is going to end soon. One thing is for sure: The impact of the blockades leading to the rise in prices of essential commodities will linger for a long time.

While blockades come and go in Manipur, the worrying divide among the two communities will not easily fade. The question now is: Who is responsible for all these losses, sufferings and trauma? An indifferent Union Government, an incapable State Government or the sectarian leaders? Perhaps all of them.

 Laishram Nandalal Singh

Remembering Bhupen Hazarika: Singer, Composer, Family Friend

By S. Mitra Kalita

Author S. Mitra Kalita with Bhupen Hazarika (center) and her elder brother Sanjib Kalita.

Growing up in the U.S., when I said I was from Assam, inevitably the most frequent response was, “Where’s that?”

But every now and then, I’d hear: “Like Bhupen Hazarika?”

The legendary singer, composer and director from the northeastern state died Saturday at the age of 86. When my mom told me, I was flooded with memories of his music playing on Sunday mornings as she fried lucees, during long car rides to family friends’ homes, as I learned to awkwardly dance and sing at Indian functions. Suddenly, as it must have been for so many fans, especially those of us with Assamese roots, the soundtrack of my life flashed before me.

I was also lucky to have known Bhupen Uncle, as I called him, in a personal capacity. He met my father during a visit to the U.S. in the late 1970s, and as often happens in immigrant groups, they forged a friendship over my banker father’s ability to help with money transfers. Anyone who knew the singer’s background and my father’s was not surprised they became fast and close friends. Both were born in Sadiya, a rural and remote pocket of the already-remote northeast. Both attended Benares Hindu University, although more than a decade apart. Both loved to read, watch foreign films and listen to music from everywhere, to discuss politics and the state of the world. Back then, both liked to drink.

And so during the U.S. legs of Bhupen Hazarika’s frequent tours in the 1970s, ‘80s and ‘90s, our house, first in Long Island, later in New Jersey, became the dumping ground for his suitcases, lyric books, harmonium, plaques and gamochas. Ours became the phone number people were given as they tried to book him for concerts, in high-school auditoriums and temples, veterans’ halls and restaurants. At first, I was starstruck by this man whose face adorned so many of our records, now sleeping in my bed. But among Bhupen Uncle’s best traits was his ability to put people at ease. In our house, he wore a lungi. He joined my mother in the kitchen and made an amazing shrimp curry. He also loved adventure, so we would pile into our brown Oldsmobile and go on long drives of serendipity.

A lover of folk music and the Civil Rights movement, Bhupen Uncle made us take pictures of him standing on Paul Robeson Place in Princeton, N.J. He had met Robeson during study at Columbia University and throughout his life clearly drew a parallel between the political activism of Robeson’s music and his own. Bhupen Uncle loved New York City and he regaled in the throngs of fans who gathered around him during shopping trips to the Indian enclave of Jackson Heights. But he was also just as happy being anonymous and roaming his old uptown haunts or Chinatown. It was with him that I first ate Thai food, a place called Pongsri on Bayard Street that I still love and frequent. He and his partner, the director Kalpana Lajmi, took my elder brother and me to see “Dead Poets Society,” a movie that sparked a discussion about the role of teachers and of following one’s own dreams over one’s parents’. Through his eyes, I realize now I was seeing America and all its plurality and possibility anew.

Yet I didn’t know it then. My appreciation of Bhupen Hazarika, like many Assamese, was perhaps too parochial, too rooted in our common home. And perhaps knowing our needs, he pandered to that role. Translation do not do his lyrics justice, but a song like “Aami Axomiya Nohoi Dukhiya”, which means “We are Assamese, not poor,” helped us stand a little taller. He also connected with the Assamese countryside intimately, despite his fame. During a visit to his native Sadiya in the 1980s, he tracked down my grandparents and visited with them. My illiterate grandmother lectured him and an accompanying politician on all the ways Sadiya and its roads and schools remained too backward—and he was only too happy to listen, just as her own son might have. To us, he remained accessible, simple, common.

He was anything but, achieving fame in multiple languages such as Bengali and Hindi, and adopting a home in Mumbai for the last several years. This truth and transcendence unveiled itself to me as I grew older. When I traveled to Mumbai in my early 20s, we would amble down Chowpatty Beach and not a single vendor charged us for anything. My father’s scratchy records now gathering dust in the basement, I turned to different translations of Bhupen Hazarika’s songs through YouTube and other sites. I came to appreciate a song like “Bistirno Dupare,” (a version of “Old Man River”) as so much more masterful in the Bengali.

In 2007, as my daughter and I settled into watch “Chak De India” in New Delhi, suddenly a special 60^th anniversary rendition of the Indian national anthem came on—and there he was. My daughter, then almost 3, yelled out, “There’s that Assamese guy.” He was joined by fellow luminaries such as Jagjit Singh, A.R. Rahman and Lata Mangeshkar.

As a child, my interpretation of many of Bhupen Hazarika’s songs were literal: about nature, rainfall, our mighty Brahmaputra. As an adult, I hear them anew with strains and themes of revolution, suffering, longing, the search for love, the endless hunt for home. Rooted perhaps in our “remote” northeast, they remain universal.

Those of us from Assam might be forgiven for always seeing dear Bhupen Uncle, Bhupenda and Bhupen Mama as “ours,” but in death—and in the reaction trickling in from all corners this weekend—Bhupen Hazarika and his legacy clearly endure as a man and musician of the world.

Tap Indian Neighbours For Profit Punch

JAYANTA ROY CHOWDHURY & R. SURYAMURTHY

New Delhi, Nov 7 : India is finally waking up to the huge benefits it can derive from trade in its immediate neighbourhood.

Bilateral trade with its South Asian neighbours rose more than a third in 2010-11 over the previous year to nearly $16 billion. Trade with Bangladesh alone has almost doubled to more than $4 billion over the same period.

To fuel this growth, India is building a web of ports, highways and railways that will help it to integrate better with the markets of the sub-continent.

Next week, even as the heads of states of the region meet in Male, Indian businessmen have started talking about a trans-subcontinental gas grid, which would carry gas from Afghanistan, Iran, Myanmar and Turkmenistan through the region and an electricity grid to distribute electricity generated in India, Bhutan and Nepal to other power-starved parts.

Bangladesh bond

In just one year, India’s two-way trade with Bangladesh has gone up from $2.68 billion to $4.05 billion. If illegal cross-border trades in cattle to Bangladesh and sarees to India are added, the figure can surge to well over $7 billion.

“Good relations and adroit commercial diplomacy by the two sides has helped us along and we hope this will grow with transit and water sharing treaties,” says Tariq Ahmad Karim, Bangladesh’s high commissioner to India.

The sudden jump was a result of an almost 68 per cent increase in Bangladesh’s exports to India over the previous year. India’s exports went up about 43 per cent over last year.

Trade is expected to be even better this year with India deciding to allow duty-free import of 43 lines of garments.

Amit Ladsaria, who runs the Calcutta-based Turtle brand, said, “They are cheaper and have huge high quality garment making capacity. So, we are testing waters. If the dollar rate holds, then we will go ahead and give contract manufacturing orders to Bangladesh units.”

Transit through Bangladesh for northeastern products could, however, be the real game changer.

Many expect Cachar in Assam, which has a history of industrialisation, and Chittagong, which could be the Northeast’s entrepôt, to become processing zones for minerals, farm and textile goods, benefiting both India and Bangladesh with the mushrooming of industries in these areas and low cost sale to mainland India and abroad.

A high-level Bangladesh tariff commission has made recommendations to the Sheikh Hasina government on the rates it should charge from Indian businesses for transit through that country. The rates roughly work out to 7 cents a tonne a km for roadways, 3 cents for railways and 2.5 cents for waterways.

Ficci secretary-general Rajiv Kumar says, “It would be a big positive for both countries if the transit treaty comes through. Just the fact that Bangladesh has decided on a rate list is good news.”

The actual deal would of course depend on political will. Sheikh Hasina has hinted that transit can be allowed if India signs treaties for sharing river water flowing from Assam and Bengal to Bangladesh.

For Bangladesh, however, there is another game changer — hooking on to India’s electricity grid. This will give it access to electricity generated not only in India but also in Bhutan and Nepal.

Bangladesh’s unmet electricity demand is estimated at over 1,200MW for 2011 and has resulted in crippling power blackouts for up to 9-10 hours in peak summer.

“We are willing to invest in Indian, Bhutanese and Nepalese thermal power plants,” for a steady supply of power, said Ahmad Karim.

Access to Pakistan

India-Pakistan trade is set to grow to $8 billion in five years with the South Asian neighbours taking steps to boost economic ties.

Trade relations between the two countries, which had gone into a deep slumber, seem to be once again waking up with Islamabad agreeing to grant India the most favoured nation status (MFN) — which means Pakistan will charge the same duties on Indian produce that it does on any signatory to the WTO trade agreement.

CII director-general Chandrajit Banerjee said, “Pakistan’s decision to grant the MFN status can transform the whole trading environment in the region.”

Pakistan still has to work on the fine print and decide which items will be off its list of imports to protect its domestic industry.

Still, New Delhi can hope to gain market access for its pharmaceutical, plastic and industrial chemical producers. Pakistan would get access for its farm products, textiles, cement and surgical instruments.

The power-deficit Islamic nation is also looking to set up transmission infrastructure in a joint ownership to facilitate the wheeling of around 500MW of electricity via Amritsar.

India is keen to export petroleum products and get natural gas through a pipeline from Turkmenistan and Iran. This will not only provide several hundred millions of dollars to Pakistan as transit fee but also spur industrial activity in the region.

Besides, the two nations are looking to ease investment norms, liberalise the visa regime and set up banks.

Analysts said the opportunities for strengthening bilateral trade and investments were huge but mostly untapped.

While Pakistan stands to gain from entering the fast growing Indian market, New Delhi, too, sees the benefit of having access to natural resources and trade routes from Asia to Europe through Pakistan.

Increased trade would also push Pakistan’s about $200-billion economy to grow at a faster pace.

At the time of independence, trade relations were very strong — 70 per cent of Pakistan’s trade were with India and New Delhi exported 63 per cent of its goods to Islamabad. It came to less than one per cent in 2010-11.

The decline in trade relations also got reflected in the economic growth of the two nations, with Pakistan’s economy growing at 2.4 per cent in 2010-11 fiscal, while India expanding 8.5 per cent during the same period.

Concerns that Indian goods could flood Pakistan’s markets and affect their domestic industry were a misnomer. Nisha Taneja, trade analyst with the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, said, “China is the biggest trading partner of Pakistan and New Delhi would have to be competitive to get its market share.”

However, the big boost would come with the preferential trade agreement, which would provide lower duties and spur greater economic activity.

Scope in Afghanistan

India is looking beyond the Silk Route to strengthen economic relations with Afghanistan. The transit trade agreement between Islamabad and Kabul will open the land route for the movement of goods through the Wagah border. New Delhi is likely to ask Islamabad to provide transit facility for its goods.

Apart from the land route, alternative trade channels are being worked out by New Delhi to strengthen economic relations between the two countries. India is looking at developing ports, rail line and roads to boost trade relations after gaining the confidence of the people of Afghanistan by setting up hospitals and other facilities.

India and Afghanistan have reached a pact on strategic and economic co-operation, including the exploration of untapped mineral wealth in the war ravaged nation.

New Delhi plans to construct a 900km railway line that will connect Chabahar port in Iran to the mineral-rich Hajigak region of Afghanistan. This will open up opportunities for Indian companies to explore Afghanistan’s mineral wealth, believed to be worth $1-3 trillion. It will also reduce Kabul’s dependence on Islamabad by gaining access to sea.

US geologists and government officials estimated last year that Afghanistan was sitting on unexploited mineral reserves such as copper, iron ore, lithium, gold and cobalt worth over $1 trillion. Gaining access to the unexplored mineral would boost the Indian economy.

The $7.6-billion Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline is likely to provide natural gas to India and boost industrial development across the pipeline in the neighbouring nations, apart from a transit fee.

“Afghanistan’s economic integration with the Indian economy and South Asia as a whole is in the national interest of the people of Afghanistan, and one of the ways to achieve this is to promote closer trade, investment and transit links,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said.

Look East Policy Would Fail Unless Northeast is Developed

Aizawl, Nov 6 : The Look East policy would not be a success unless India first develops its Northeast areas, former Indian ambassador to Myanmar Aloke Sen said.

Speaking at a seminar on India s Look East Policy: Implications for North East India with special reference to Mizoram at Pachhunga University College here yesterday, the former ambassador said, India should first develop the Northeast like China has done to its Yunan province.

As Yunan province is important to China s trade relations with south Asian countries, Northeast is to India s trade ties with Southeast Asia. Mizoram has special importance to the Look East Policy as it is the only state in India that shares boundaries with Myanmar and Bangladesh, Sen also pointed out.

Mizoram is an entry point for the Kaladan multi modal transport project, he said.

While pointing out that Myanmar was keen to have close ties with India, the former ambassador to Myanmar said the North Eastern region would benefit from trade and commerce with Myanmar which was proposed in the Look East Policy.

The seminar was part of the Ministry of External Affairs distinguished lectures series and was jointly organised by Pachhunga University College s political science and the MEA.

Manipur Economic Blockade Enters 98th Day

By Priyanka Gupta

Imphal, Nov 6 : The Manipur blockade has entered its 98th day on Sunday. Women gheraoing ministers, trucks in flames and charred vehicles lining the roads are the scenes in the Senapati district of Manipur, which has become the epicentre of the economic blockade.

The United Naga council is continuing to oppose the bifurcation of the district, which would result in a separate Kuki dominated Sadar Hills area.

S Milan, Information and Publicity Secretary of the United Naga Council, said, "The land of the Nagas have been divided and bifurcated since colonial times. Further bifurcation of our land is not acceptable."

The government agreeing to the Kuki demand has only sharpened the divide. But what remains common to both the Nagas and the Kukis is extreme poverty and neglect. The children of the hills bear the neglect and while some agree that splitting the district for administrative purposes may have its merits, with the Assembly elections near, it is a decision that may further polarise the debate.

Biren Singh, Manipur Government Spokesperson, said, "What is the problem if we decide to bifurcate the district and make Sadar Hill a separate district? We are not playing communal politics."

The Kukis and the Nagas share a bloody history of ethnic conflict, which is now being played out on the state's highways affecting thousands of people.

Ngamkhohao Haokip, President, Sadar Hill District Demand Committee, said, "The whole community adopted this bandh culture as a means to pressurise the government because the Manipur government is stubborn."

Bhupen Hazarika: Poet, music composer, singer and ‘wanderer’: Dead

A poet, music composer, singer, actor, journalist, author and filmmaker, the self-proclaimed jajabor (wanderer) took the rich folk heritage of Assam and interpreted it beautifully for the world through his songs.

Mumbai, Nov 5 : Bhupen Hazarika, the ‘bard of Brahmaputra’ whose ability to weave magic out of traditional Assamese music gave us songs like Dil hoom hoom kare‘ and O Ganga behti ho, swayed and inspired millions across generations with the power and passion of his voice.

A poet, music composer, singer, actor, journalist, author and filmmaker, the self-proclaimed jajabor (wanderer) took the rich folk heritage of Assam and interpreted it beautifully for the world through his songs.

With his death, the country has lost not only one of its few balladeers but also one of its greatest cultural icons, cherished in Dhaka as much as in Guwahati.

Born in 1926 in Sadiya into a family of teachers, the academically-talented Hazarika completed his basic education from Guwahati in 1942, BA from Banaras Hindu University in 1944 and MA (Pol Sc) in 1946. He did his PhD in Mass Communication from Columbia University. He also received the Lisle Fellowship from Chicago University, US to study the use of educational project development through cinema.

During his stay in the US, he met the legendary black singer Paul Robeson, whose famous number ‘Old man river’ was successfully transformed to the megahit Bistirno parore (O Ganga behti ho in Hindi), a virtual anthem for generations of pro-Left activists.

In an interview to a national daily many years ago, he attributed his singing to tribal music.

“As a child, I grew up listening to tribal music – its rhythm saw me developing an inclination towards singing. Perhaps, I inherited my singing skills from my mother, who sang lullabies to me. In fact, I have used one of my mother’s lullabies in ‘Rudali’,” the Dadasaheb Phalke winner had said.

He sang his first song Biswa nijoy nojowan (in the second Assamese film Indramalati) in 1939 at the age of 12.

In addition to his native Assamese, Hazarika composed, wrote and sang for numerous Bengali and Hindi films from 1930s to the 1990s besides other songs. He was also one of the leading author-poets of Assam with more than 1,000 lyrics and several books on short stories, essays, travelogues, poems and children’s rhymes.

He produced and directed, composed music and sang for Assamese films like Era Batar Sur, Shakuntala, Loti ghoti, Pratidhwani, Chick Mick Bijuli, Swikarokti and Siraj. His most famous Hindi films include his long-time companion Kalpana Lajmi’s Rudaali, Ek Pal, Darmiyaan,Daman and Kyon, Sai Paranjpe’s Papiha and Saaz, Mil Gayee Manzil Mujhe and M F Husain’s Gajagamini.

“You paint through your songs. But I can’t sing with my paintbrush. It’s up to you to fill this lacuna in my artistry. That’s why I’ve taken you,” Husain apparently told Hazarika after choosing him for the music score of Gajagamini.

Last year, Hazarika featured in his first music video — Our Northeast, Our Star with music and lyrics by 3 Idiots duo Shantanu Moitra and Swanand Kirkire. He also lent his voice to this year’s film Gandhi To Hitler, where he sang Mahatma Gandhi’s favourite bhajan Vaishnav jan.

He came to Mumbai to work in the Indian People’s Theatre Movement (IPTA) with Salil Chowdhury, Balraj Sahni and other Marxist intellectuals.

He soon made the city his second home. “The generous city and its people have welcomed me, accepted me, and given me my second home since so many years. I admire its people for its willingness to allow people from the rest of India to earn a living and prosper, irrespective of caste, creed or colour,” he once said about his life in Mumbai.

He received the National Award for Best Music Director in 1976 for Chameli Memsaab and President’s medal for his films Shakuntala (1960), Pratidhwani (1964) and Lotighoti (1967). He was a member of the Assam Legislative Assembly from 1967-72 and was awarded the Padmashri in 1977 and the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1987. He was the chairman of the Sangeet Natak Akademi from 1999-2004.

He was also a member of Assam Film Development Council and the Central Board of Film Certification. In 2003, he was appointed member of the Prasar Bharati Board.