Another Economic Blockade in Manipur. The Government is A Spectator

Loaded trucks stranded since July 31 in between Senapati Hq and Karong due to the economic blockade called by the SHDDC.

LPG, petrol and diesel have run dry, there is an acute scarcity of oxygen cylinders and life saving drugs. Prices of essential commodities are skyrocketing due to the forced closure of NH-39 that links capital Imphal with Dimapur in Nagaland, reports Ratnadip Choudhury

N Ramandra Singh and his wife Savitri Devi live in the Singimei locality of Imphal. They have two LPG connections and Ramandra owns a Royal Enfield motorcycle and a Tata Indica car. Yet, these days Savitri does her cooking on logs and charcoal, while her husband rides around in his old bicycle. Lest one think this couple is practicing a fuel conservation campaign, they are not. They are battling a blockade.

Manipur is smarting from an economic blockade – the latest from what has now become regular annual fare – that started on 31 July 2011 and another counter blockade from 21 August 2011. LPG, petrol and diesel have run dry, there is an acute scarcity of oxygen cylinders and life saving drugs and prices of essential commodities are skyrocketing due to the forced closure of NH-39 that links capital Imphal with Dimapur in Nagaland.

The bone of contention is the possibility of the creation of a new district – the Special Area Demarcated Autonomous Region (SADAR) hills – carving out three sub-divisions of Kangpokpi, Saikul and Saitu Gamphazol from the district of Senapati. The demand for creation of the SADAR hills district has been a long standing one from the Kuki tribe and is spearheaded by the SADAR Hill Districthood Demand Committee (SHDDC). On the other hand, the Nagas living in the four hill districts of Manipur – Ukhrul, Tamenglong, Chandel and Senapati – are vehemently opposed to the idea as they do not want any bifurcation of Naga inhabited areas in the state.

The apex Naga body in Manipur, the United Naga Council (UNC), is adamant that it will not give an inch of land from the Naga villages for the new district. The blockades have made things worse as the Meitieis living in the Imphal valley begrudge the move and might even retaliate. The last nail in the coffin is the failure of the Okram Ibobi Singh government to handle a political demand of creation of a separate district and an administrative problem of forced closure of the national highway differently. It is instead hoping that this too shall pass.

“The least Ibobi should have done is to open the national highway. In the 10 years that he has been CM, Ibobi has taken the state from the frying pan into the fire. Every time a crisis has come, he has waited for it to die down. This might boomerang on him in the ensuing Assembly polls in the state,” observes Rishikanta Sharma, a retired school teacher.

One can sense trouble right from the moment one takes the NH-39 from Imphal. A five kilometre long queue for fuel meets the eye. No other vehicles on the road, hardly any people. In Gamgiphai, scene of the first blockade, roads are dug up, charred vehicles torched by protesters lie at the sides, huge boulders obstruct the stretches – a virtual battle zone. In just a few years, a series of economic blockades has left Manipur’s economy crippled. More than hard reason, it is a politics of emotions and ethnicity that drives the crisis. “Our demand is very much legitimate. Long ago, the Manipur government had cleared the decision of the creation of a separate SADAR Hills district. We just want its implementation. The current government wants political mileage out of the issue, and we will not step back,” reacts Ngamkhohao Haokip, president of SHDDC. In 1982, the Manipur cabinet first decided that the SADAR hills district would be carved out. In 2000, the W Nipamacha Singh cabinet reaffirmed the 1982 decision of the creation of SADAR hills, but subsequent Congress governments have put it in cold storage.

“My firm stand is that it (SADAR Hills) has to be given with some adjustments in the boundary. It was there during the British rule. SADAR Hills was also there during the commissioner’s rule, with some villages from here and there, which disturbed the compactness of the hills. That can still be rectified. If that compact area can be demarcated for them, they can have it,” says former chief minister and Rajya Sabha MP Rishang Keishing. “There is no question of it going against Nagas because we are from the same state. They are no newcomers.” But the Nagas are unrelenting. “The Naga people need to be consulted. The Manipur government cannot go against the MoU and it seems that Ibobi is trying to divide the hill tribes. He will pay for it in the ensuing Assembly polls. He should not dare the Naga unity, we are not against the Kuki but they have to understand that they are playing into Ibobi’s hands,” reacts a top UNC leader from Senapati on condition of anonymity. The MoU he mentions was signed on 10 November 1992, where the Manipur government had committed to promote basic human rights and to assiduously work to ensure the peaceful co-existence of the tribals, particularly the Nagas staying in Manipur. The Nagas feel that bifurcation of Naga-inhabited areas would be a breach of that agreement.

The Kuki’s hit back. “We are not asking for a separate homeland, we are only asking for a new district for better development of the area. The Nagas and the government should not oppose it,” says 57-year-old Phalneiting Sitlhou from Kangpokpi, the proposed headquarters of SADAR hills district.

The buck clearly stops at Ibobi Singh. A high-level committee has been led by Chief Secretary DS Poonia to look into the SADAR Hills district issue and pass a resolution in the Assembly for the creation of a district boundary commission. The high level committee has been given three months to come up with its report but by then Manipur might go for early polls. All this makes it seem as if the CM is trying to buy time. Although the opposition parties in the state are high on rhetoric, Ibobi is actually enjoying the luxury of having no strong alternative in the state. But, there are 20 tribal seats at stake. “If the economic blockade continues for another month, then the people might lose patience,” warns Pradip Phanjoubam, editor of Imphal Free Press. “The state is yet to fully recover from last year’s 68 days blockade and this could have been avoided. Civil society in Imphal will not remain silent, then it will become even more difficult for the state government.”

Although the creation of a district will not put administrative blocks, what could be a problem is that in Manipur all the revenue districts are in the valley and the non-revenue districts are in the hills. SADAR Hills includes some areas of the valley too. Demarcating land in the hills therefore could mean a stiff resistance from the Meitei farmers residing there. Watchers believe the government can handle this prudently but the larger question remains whether the government has any prudence at all.

Perhaps Manipur needs a separate administrative set up to bring back trust among communities, but for now all eyes on Ibobi if he can get the national highway opened.

With inputs from Sharatchandra Sharma in Imphal and Prakhar Jain in New Delhi

Ratnadip Choudhury is a Principal Correspondent with Tehelka. ratnadip@tehelka.com

Five CMs To Accompany PM to Dhaka

New Delhi, Sep 1 : Signaling the growing importance of Bangladesh to India, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will take along five chief ministers to Dhaka when he travels there next week for one of his biggest foreign policy moves in the region.

The chief ministers of West Bengal, Assam, Tripura, Meghalaya and Mizoram will accompany Singh, an event that is extremely rare in Indian politics. It is intended to signal to Bangladesh that India is ready to press the reset button on ties with its eastern neighbor.

The visit is likely to see India and Bangladesh finally working out a comprehensive boundary agreement.

This would be the logical implementation of the Indira-Mujib agreement of 1974, which could not be implemented since Mujib was assassinated in 1975.

While its no secret that India's ties with the Awami League is much more pleasant, Indian sources said they were going the extra mile to keep the opposition BNP on board.

Bangladeshi opposition leader Begum Khaleda Zia will meet Singh, which Indians see as the first step in a continued engagement of all sides of political opinion in Bangladesh.

Does Arunachal Pradesh Really Have The Highest Growth Rate?

Their reason for being at the top of the league table is probably the low base for these states

By Manas Chakravarty

Guess which is the fastest growing state in the country. Is it Gujarat, much tom-tommed for its industry-friendly policies? Could it be Maharashtra, where Mumbai remains, despite recent attempts to reduce it to a parochial village, a throbbing cosmopolitan metropolis, home to the country’s entrepreneurial elite? Or is it one of the southern states such as Tamil Nadu, which has attracted so many industries? Or, wait a bit, could it be once-laggard states such as Bihar, which is now purportedly in the process of catching up rapidly with the rest of the country?

A couple of years ago, economists discovered that economic growth had suddenly taken wing in Bihar. Growth in its gross domestic product (GDP) in 2008-09 was an astounding 13%. A few months later, Chhattisgarh became the new champion, as economists found that its growth was the highest in 2009-10.

Alas, no longer. Even these new poster boys of growth have bitten the dust. The data provided by the Central Statistics Office shows that the front-runner among high-growth states in 2009-10 was, hold your breath, Arunachal Pradesh, whose GDP grew by a mind-blowing 22.43%. Eat your heart out, mainstream India, the north-eastern star is rising, despite decades of neglect.

There’s more to the story. In second place was another surprise—Mizoram, with a growth rate of 13.95%. Goa came third in 2009-10, growing its GDP by 13.03%. That’s not all. It now turns out that Bihar was not really the fastest growing state in 2008-09—that honour goes to Mizoram, with a growth rate of 13.91%, while Bihar came second. Andaman and Nicobar Islands, growing by 11.17%, came third.

As a matter of fact, 2005-06 was the last year in which the fastest growing states were the conventional champions. In that year, Gujarat was the most rapidly growing state, followed by Maharashtra. Since then, however, the league tables have gone haywire. In 2006-07, the leader was Chhattisgarh, followed by Bihar. Andaman and Nicobar Islands came third. In 2007-08, the top spot was taken by Jharkhand, which grew by a huge 20.52%. Uttarakhand came second. The top ranks for 2008-09 and 2009-10 have already been given above. Mizoram’s average growth rate between 2007 and 2010 has been 12.9%. The average for Arunachal Pradesh in those three years was 13.98%.

Does this mean that these north-eastern states have now become the new growth hubs? That’s unlikely. Their reason for being at the top of the league table is probably the low base for these states. Could the data be wrong? That too would hardly be surprising, considering that the total of the states’ and Union territories’ GDP does not add up to India’s GDP. In 2008-09, the states’ total was lower than the all-India figure by Rs2.18 trillion (at 2004-05 prices), slightly lower than Karnataka’s GDP. In 2009-10, the all-India was higher than the states’ total by Rs2.24 trillion. In short, there’s a huge discrepancy in the data, about 5% of the country’s total GDP.

Let’s look a bit further. If we take the states’ domestic products at 1999-2000 prices, we find that the picture doesn’t really change and the rankings turn out to be equally odd. For instance, in 2000-01, Nagaland recorded the highest rate of growth among states, with a growth rate of 16.6%. Bihar came second, with a growth rate of 16.04%. In 2000-01, Arunachal Pradesh was numero uno, with a growth rate of 15.7% while Tripura came second, growing by 14.07%. In 2002-03, Chandigarh was first, followed by Bihar. Rajasthan and Jharkhand were the leaders in the following years.

But wait a bit. There’s also a huge difference between the growth rates if we take 1999-00 constant prices and 2004-05 constant prices. Arunachal Pradesh’s growth according to the 1999-00 prices for 2006-07 was 13.75%, for 2007-08 6.36%, for 2008-09 5.87%. At 2004-05 constant prices, the growth for 2006-07 is 4.95%, 12.01% for 2007-08 and 7.51% for 2008-09. Why should GDP at 2004-05 prices be so much lower than GDP at 1999-00 prices for 2006-07 and so much higher in 2007-08?

For Bihar, GDP growth at 1999-00 prices for 2008-09 is 16.59% while it is 13.06% at 2004-05 prices. That is fine, perhaps the 2004-05 series lowers growth? But in 2009-10, the state GDP computed according to the 2004-05 prices is 8.56% while it is much lower, at 4.72% at 1999-00 prices. This is absurd.

A friend of mine, who worked in a nationalized bank, told me a story about how, when he was posted in a village branch, he was once asked to respond immediately to a parliamentary question. The question was about how many Christians, Muslims, Sikhs and other minorities he had given advances to. But the bank records did not mention the religion of the borrower. My friend estimated that the village in which he was posted had about 50% Muslims and the rest Hindus. He accordingly took the total number of borrowers, divided it by two and said that was the number of Muslims financed by his branch. All over the country, bank managers adopted similar methods. The upshot was a completely bogus report on minority financing by banks reached Parliament and there must have been impassioned debates on this absolutely useless piece of information. Given the problems with the GDP, Index of Industrial Production and the state GDP numbers, I suspect most macro information in this country might be collected in the innovative manner my friend adopted.

**Manas Chakravarty looks at trends and issues in the financial markets. Comment at capitalaccount@livemint.com

A Tale Of Two Indian Hunger Strikers

By Rupam Jain Nair

Indian authorities force-feed the "Iron Lady of Manipur", as she has been dubbed, through a plastic drip in her nose (AFP/File)

New Delhi: Two Indian hunger strikers, Anna Hazare and Irom Sharmila, both used the same non-violent weapon -- but one amassed nationwide support in days, the other lies on a hospital bed in obscurity.

Arrested and confined to a medical college ward in the remote, revolt-hit northeastern state of Manipur, Sharmila has been on hunger strike for more than 10 years to protest against a controversial anti-insurgency law.

Indian authorities force-feed the "Iron Lady of Manipur", as she has been dubbed, through a plastic drip in her nose to prevent her death.

While nearly a million people thronged the New Delhi venue where social activist Hazare, 74, staged a 12-day anti-corruption fast this month, Sharmila has never experienced such a massive groundswell of support.

"My sister is the world's longest hunger striker but who cares about her and her cause?" Sharmila's brother Irom Singhajit told AFP from Manipur's capital, Imphal, 1,500 miles (2,415 kilometres) from New Delhi.

"Who cares about a faraway state?" he said.

Sharmila, now 39, a poet, launched her fast in November 2000, demanding repeal of the draconian Armed Forces Special Powers Act following the killing of 10 people by troops in retaliation for a militant attack.

"My sister was not fortunate enough to be able to turn her protest into a popular movement as she was arrested immediately on charges of attempted suicide," said Singhajit.

While nearly a million people thronged the New Delhi venue where Hazare staged a 12-day anti-corruption fast (AFP/File, Sajjad Hussain)

Manipur is home to 2.5 million people and around 30 ethnic insurgent groups.

The government has dismissed appeals from Sharmila and others to end the sweeping emergency powers that human rights groups say give security forces a licence to shoot and arrest with impunity in both the northeast and in revolt-racked Indian Kashmir.

Every two weeks jail officials produce Sharmila in court to renew her judicial custody on charges of trying to kill herself. Her family members must seek court permission to visit her.

In contrast Hazare's fast ended last weekend when the national government conceded in principle to the former army truck driver's demands for tougher anti-corruption legislation.

Hazare wrote to Sharmila while he was staging his hunger strike, urging her to join the New Delhi protest.

But Sharmila wrote from her hospital bed: "I am unlucky because I cannot come to New Delhi. I am not a free Indian."

She backed Hazare's movement against graft, but also said she wished people across India would support the fight for repeal of the emergency law.

It is a forlorn hope, according to political analysts.

"Anna's movement targets corruption, an issue spread throughout the Indian system which bothers every Indian," said Ravi Bahl, a sociology professor at Delhi University.

He said Sharmila would have generated much more support if she and her cause had been based in a major city such as New Delhi. "He had the location advantage," he said of Hazare.

Sharmila's fast has never generated much debate in India's national parliament because of New Delhi's indifference towards distant Manipur, which shares a border with Myanmar, said other analysts.

"The Indian government made Anna Hazare a hero but they treat Irom Sharmila like a criminal," said Ranjan Thapa, a political analyst at the Centre for Eastern Political Research in Kolkata.

"This reflects the discrimination against northeastern states," he said. "Irom Sharmila lives in a fringe state and will never get to centre-stage."

Puritan Pundits Should Chill Out -- Here Are 5 Reasons I'm Happy I've Had Lots of Casual Sex

By Greta Christina

Things don't have to be permanent to be valuable. A fleeting moment can have as much value as a stone monument.

The phenomenon of women who have sex for its own sake seems to baffle many people. It's widely believed that women have sex for love, commitment, poor self-control, to manipulate men, to please men, to make babies, to sooth their low self-esteem, and just about any reason at all other than their own pleasure. (While men, of course, are rutting horndogs who just want to stick it in the nearest wet hole available.) Sex, according to this trope, is by its nature a commodity that women possess and men are trying to obtain... and the phenomenon of women who are "giving it away," who are defying these assumptions and treating sex as a pleasurable interaction between equals, is making the media piss all over themselves.

Mark Regnerus, Slate: "If women were more fully in charge of how their relationships transpired, we'd be seeing, on average, more impressive wooing efforts, longer relationships, fewer premarital sexual partners, shorter cohabitations, and more marrying going on."

Rachel Simmons, relationship advice columnist for Teen Vogue: "These letters worry me. They signify a growing trend in girls' sexual lives where they are giving themselves to guys on guys' terms. They hook up first and ask later. "

Bill O'Reilly: "Many women who get pregnant are blasted out of their minds when they have sex."

Susan Walsh, Hooking Up Smart: "They cannot see that as she [self-proclaimed proud-and-happy slut Jaclyn Friedman] proclaims her detachment from sex, she gets emotionally wounded every single time. They take heart from her proclamation that sluthood is a healing thing. Ms. Friedman is a hot mess. Craiglist Casual Encounters was not a miracle, it was a disaster that broke her heart again. I hope she does find Love, the whole enchilada."

Laura Sessions Stepp, author of Unhooked: How Young Women Pursue Sex, Delay Love and Lose at Both... oh, just look at the title.

Then there's the piece that got me staying up until four in the morning writing about this in the first place: Christian author Don Miller, who recently asked his female readers (and his male ones, in a separate post) if they've ever had casual sex, and if so, why. Miller doesn't ask this in a neutral way, a way that expresses a genuine desire for an honest answer. He asks in a way that makes it obvious what he thinks the answer will be -- whatever the reason is, it must be bad, bad, bad. In fact, he's asking in a way that totally slants the answers he's likely to get. He's asking "why some girls give up sex easily" (as if sex for women is always a surrender) and "do you use sex for some kind of social power or to make yourself feel good?"

It's like a push-poll -- a political poll designed to elicit a particular response, so you can shape people's opinions and make your position seem more popular than it really is.

And this push-poll tendency is shared by many of those who ask, "Why on earth would women want casual hookups?" They're not asking, "Why do some women have casual sex?" They're asking, "Why on earth would some women have casual sex, when it's so clearly a bad idea that will do them and other women harm and is obviously not in their best interest?" And they're doing this despite research showing that casual sex isn't, in fact psychologically harmful for young adults. They're basing their questions on the common assumption that women's natural state is to keep their legs closed unless they've got their hands on marriage or commitment... and that women who don't are some sort of baffling phenomenon that needs to be explained.

So I thought I'd try to explain it.

I've had a lot of experience with casual sex. It's been a while, and I'm not particularly interested in it anymore. But for many years, pretty much all the sex I had fell somewhere on the "casual" spectrum. Personal ad hookups; occasional sex with friends; sex clubs and sex parties; ongoing sexual friendships... that's what my sex life looked like for a long time.

And needless to say -- but I'm going to say it anyway -- a lot of this casual sex was a good idea. A wonderful idea, in fact. A lot of it was done for excellent, healthy reasons. And the effect it's had on my sex life and my love life has been overwhelmingly positive.

You want to know why I had it? Here's why.

1: Fun. This is first and foremost. In fact, all the other answers I'm about to give ultimately boil down to this one: Sex is fun. Sex feels good. Sex is its own justification. And that was every bit as true when I was single as when I've been coupled. I had sex for the same reason billions of other people have sex: Pleasure. Period.

We evolved to enjoy sex. We are descended from thousands of generations of ancestors who really, really liked to fuck. Asking why people have sex casually is like asking why people eat food casually. Eating feels good. Food is fun. It's often more fun when it's meaningful and done with people we love. But that's not always an option, and it can still be pretty darned fun when it's grabbed on the fly with acquaintances and strangers. We evolved to want to eat food. And we evolved to want to have sex. Like, duh.

2: Experimentation. When I was having casual sex with a lot of different people, I was also having lots of different kinds of sex. There are lots of reasons for that: some obvious, some not so obvious. The most obvious one is that my partners liked different things, so I tried the things they liked, to see if I might like them too. Plus, at the time, I felt more comfortable asking for and trying some of my freakier desires with fuckbuddies and casual hookups than I had with long-term romantic partners. I do wish that hadn't been true -- I wish I'd been less shy about experimenting with my LTR partners in my younger days -- but the whole stupid virgin/whore thing can get pretty deeply embedded, and it took many years of screwing around to get it (mostly) hacked out of my brain.

And that experimenting was awesome. I figured out an immense amount about my sexuality during my casual sex years. I learned a huge amount about which of my fantasies were really things I liked, and which were things I just liked thinking about. I figured out that yes, I really was a dyke, and yes, I really was kinky. And I discovered things about my sexuality that I never would have imagined if I hadn't tried them. My sex life is about a billion times more satisfying now that I know what I do and don't like in bed... and now that I have the courage to ask for it. Like, duh.

I haven't stopped learning and experimenting now that I'm married. And plenty of people do plenty of experimenting with just one partner, and do it entirely happily. But that's not how it played out for me. And when I think about who I was in my twenties, I'm not sure it could have played out that way for me. When I think about who I was in my 20s, I think casual sex with a large-ish number of people was the only way I was going to get those experiments under my belt. As it were.

3: Pleasure without unwanted commitment. As you may have figured out from this piece, I was single for a long time. After my divorce and before I fell in love with Ingrid, I was single for 12 years. And they were good years. Most of them, anyway. Staying single for so long was a conscious decision, and it was one of the best decisions I've made in my life. After my divorce, I was pretty confused, with some seriously messed-up ideas about love and relationships, and I had a strong tendency to be attracted to needy, fucked-up drug addicts. Staying single for 12 years gave me a chance to get my head screwed on straight; to re-train myself to be attracted to people who had their act together; to wait for the right partner instead of jumping into commitment with whoever was available; to learn that I could be happy and fulfilled on my own. In fact, my relationship and marriage with Ingrid wouldn't be nearly as strong if I hadn't been single -- and happily single -- for so long.

But if I'd tried to be celibate during all those years, I would have gone bananas. I never would have stuck it out.

Not everyone wants to be in a relationship. Not everyone should be in a relationship. Some people are better off single: temporarily, or indefinitely. I was one of them, for over a decade. And casual sex let me stay single... while still having the pleasure and confidence and connection and other yummy things that sex provides.

4: Independence and confidence. Catting around made me feel like a million bucks. And not just in the obvious way. It made me feel powerful, self-reliant, curious and playful, free and fun. It taught me the value of adventure. It taught me that awesome surprises can be around any corner if I'm open to them. It taught me that even crummy experiences can make for a really great story. It taught me strength and self-confidence. It taught me that saying "No" didn't make me a selfish jerk. It taught me that being told "No" didn't make me a pathetic loser.

I still feel that way. I haven't forgotten those lessons. And I am deeply grateful for everything in my life that got me there. Including casual sex. Casual sex wasn't the only thing that helped me feel powerful and self-reliant, adventurous and playful, independent and confident... but it was one of the things, one of the most crucial things, and I am profoundly thankful for it.

5: Intimacy and connection. Casual doesn't necessarily mean impersonal. A lot of the casual sex I had was fairly nonchalant. But a lot of it wasn't. A lot of it was very intimate indeed. It came out of a moment of feeling connected with another human being, and wanting to expand that connection. I didn't want romance or marriage with these people. But I cared about them, and I felt close with them, and I wanted to experience that closeness in a sexual way.

Some of those people started out as casual hookups, and became good friends over weeks and months. Some of them started out as friends, and the sex -- whether it happened semi-regularly or was just one many-splendored night -- deepened those friendships, and gave them a little extra sparkle and tingle. But they all have one thing in common... which is that I still feel affection towards them, and still have fond memories of the sex we had, and don't regret it for a minute.

I realize that this is a very atheist/ humanist philosophy of life, and one that a Christian writer like Don Miller is unlikely to respond to. But things don't have to be permanent to be valuable. A fleeting moment can have as much value as a stone monument. And that includes moments of sexual intimacy and connection

It Gets Better

I realize that I'm only one person, telling one person's story. And I realize that the plural of anecdote is not data. My experiences are largely supported by the data, but they aren't universal. I had a lot of things going for me that loaded the "casual sex" dice in my favor -- among other things, I was mostly having all this casual sex with other women, so the gender imbalances and weird sexual/ romantic power dynamics between women and men were a non-issue. And I realize that not everyone shares my experience. Some people go into casual sex for good, healthy reasons, and some people do it for bad, unhealthy reasons, and many people do it for a combination of the two. And some people have good outcomes from it, and some have crummy outcomes, and some have outcomes that are a mixed bag.

You know. Just like people go into marriage and committed relationships for good reasons and bad reasons and combinations of the two... with good, and bad, and mixed results.

And I'm not going to pretend that my casual sex was always perfect and awesome. It wasn't. Some of it was boring and pointless; a little of it was icky and sad. I'm not even going to pretend that my reasons for having it were always entirely healthy. I sometimes had casual sex, in part, to bolster my self-image as a nonconformist, or because that's what everyone else in my social circle was doing (yes, those two things are contradictory -- what's your point?), or as a salve for feeling lonely and unattractive, or because I didn't want to hurt someone's feelings by saying "No." Especially in the earlier days. Like most things in life, I got better at it as I went along.

But you know what? That was true of sex in relationships, too. Especially in my younger days. I didn't always have it for healthy reasons, and it wasn't always that great. But it got better as I went along. Much, much better. Sex at 49 is so much better than sex at 23, I can't even tell you.

And it got better, in large part, because of my years of casual sex. It's better because of the independence and confidence I got from casual sex... independence and confidence that strengthens me to this day. It's better because of the experiments I carried out during casual sex... experiments that helped me map out my sexuality and enjoy it to its fullest. It's better because of the moments of genuine connection I had during casual sex... moments that taught me how to pursue intimacy and make myself open to it. It's better because of all the sheer pleasure I got from casual sex... which helped me to value pleasure, and embrace it, and make it a priority in my marriage. It's better because of the years of being happily single which casual sex made possible... years that enabled me to wait for the right person, and turn myself into the right person, to make our love and our marriage work.

Sex, and marriage, and life, are better because of casual sex. For me, anyway. And no stupid push-poll in the world is going to change that answer.

Read more of Greta Christina at her blog.

Stephanie Smith in MeInMyPlace Photoshoot

As part of an ongoing series, Stephanie Smith shot by MeInMyPlace for Esquire Magazine.

You want to know the secret ingredient? Then it wouldn’t be a secret, would it? Well, fine: Normally you use powdered sugar. But for these, I use granulated sugar. So it’s got a different texture. The icing is more grainy. But in a good way.

 

Usually I wait a couple hours before I put the icing on. It’s a secret family recipe.

 

I would say I feel my sexiest right before we go out on the field. We have our hair and makeup all done, and we’re standing in the tunnel. We can see the crowd, but they can’t see us. And then they announce us and we walk out and the crowd goes crazy. It’s the best. It’s like a drug.

 

They’re real, by the way. God-given. It’s like that Seinfeld episode: They’re real, and they’re spectacular.

 

I do them in my apartment. I’m dancing around, and I’m famous for leaving the blinds open. If anybody saw me, I would look so ridiculous.

 

I always fall for those fitness videos sold on TV. I’ve been doing P90X for a couple of years, and now I’m doing TurboFire. I get so into it. I start talking to the TV. Like they’ll ask me how I’m doing, and I’ll be like, I’m doing great! It’s so corny, but I love it.

 

The cookies don’t melt, but they get soft like cake would. They become the same texture as cake. It’s really good.

 

I put an Oreo inside each one. They’re so good because of it. Some people ground up the Oreo, but I put them in whole. You don’t taste it right away. It’s a surprise.

…but people are usually pretty good. They’ll watch for a few minutes and then move on.

 

We practice at Bally’s. They sponsor us. It’s near the Linc — pretty centrally located. And we practice in a dance room with open windows…

 

The hot-pink outfit comes out from time to time, I’ll say that. Sometimes I just keep it for me. When I want to make myself feel happy.

 

I’ve been baking my whole life. My mother got me started on it. She makes these extravagant cakes and stuff, so I’ve been around it my whole life — it feels natural. I don’t even have to think about it.

 

So when I’m getting ready, sometimes I’ll dance a little, to see how the moves look in the uniform. You want to make sure you’re always looking your best.

 

The only time I wear the uniform around the house is when I’m getting ready for an event. We have a lot of different pieces to the uniform, probably seven or eight — boy shorts, skirt, sweater.

 

After the games you’re tired — you can’t wait to go home and go to bed. I’ve never fallen asleep in my uniform, though. That would be really crazy.

 

It’s a big day, game day. We have to get there four hours before kickoff, so it’s like an eight-hour day at the stadium. We practice for maybe an hour, then we go outside the stadium and meet with fans. And you’re “on” the whole time. It can be exhausting.

 

You thought I’d only have one pair of pom-poms? Girls don’t have one pair of anything. Pom-poms are like shoes.

If the Philadelphia Eagles have a dream team this year, they’ve got the sideline support to match. And we know a thing or two about this stuff — every week on Esquire.com, Monday Morning Cheerleader brings you actually insightful analysis from the only women closer to the action than Bob Costas. So, as a gift to the world of men, and especially to Eagles fans — that was some storm — third-year cheerleader Stephanie Smith invited over our photographer friend to her apartment outside of Philly for a little break from his normally difficult work at MeInMyPlace.com. It was inspirational. —The Editors

In Northeast India, RTI Activists At The Receiving End

By Samudra Gupta Kashyap

Even as Anna Hazare’s fast caused nationwide awareness about corruption, RTI activists in different states of the Northeastern region continue to face harassment and threats.

Seventeen families from Meghalaya filed an FIR against the village council for denying food grains supplied by the government. An RTI application filed by them revealed that while the government had supplied food grains for BPL families in Dongrum in East Khasi Hills district, the families had not received them for 72 months. An inquiry was instituted after the harassed families lodged a complaint.

This is the second incident of villagers being ostracised in Meghalaya for asking questions through RTI. Last year, three women of Jongksha village were ostracized for bringing to light anomalies in implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act through RTI. The State Women’s Commission had to intervene to restore their social rights.

In February, Bobby Basaiawaomoit, a resident of Mairangbah in West Khasi Hills district, had lodged a complaint saying the village council had threatened to impose a fine and ostracize him for ‘creating trouble’ in the village by using RTI.

Sanjit Das and his family were attacked on August 14 for seeking information through RTI about food grain supply under PDS in Sonitpur district. Das was seriously injured and is currently hospitalized. He was also assaulted a few months ago for exposing PDS anomalies, causing arrest of several fair price shop owners.

“Seeking information under the RTI Act has become a risky affair in Assam and other Northeastern states. In most cases, the anomalies are committed by a nexus involving officials and contractors, who engage miscreants to threaten and attack the applicants,” said Saito Basumatary of People’s Rights Forum, a Guwahati-based platform of RTI activists.

In Manipur, people asking questions under the RTI Act formed a platform to put up a united fight against harassment and delays in getting replies from authorities.

“While officials often deny or cause delay in giving information, threats and attacks on applicants have become commonplace,” said W Joykumar, convenor of RTI activist platform Transparency Initiatives, Manipur.

Northeast Law University Enrolls First Batch Of Students

Guwahati, Sep 1 : The first batch of students got enrolled in the first National Law University of the northeast in Guwahati on Tuesday.

The administration and students are hopeful that the new addition to the law universities will open up a new avenue for professional law studies in the northeast and provide scope for students of law to avail a high-quality infrastructure to compete with the best law schools any where on the globe.

Speaking to TOI on Tuesday, vice-chancellor of the National Law University, Assam, Gurjit Singh expressed his willingness to work for taking professionalism in law education to new heights in the northeastern region and especially Assam.

The classes for five-year integrated BA LLB course for the first batch would start on September 1 at the university with 25 per cent seats reserved for students of Assam.

"Undoubtedly, the law university which is the 13{+t} {+h} organization in India, would be able to cater to the needs of law students of the northeast. The Assam government and the University Grants Commission will fund various development projects to be taken up in the coming days. Funds will also be provided from the Annual Central Assistance", Singh added.

He said the world class library and the Centre of excellence is equipped with extensive study on international humanitarian law, comparative law, and consumer protection law, human rights etc.

"We would urge UGC to provide infrastructure to set up an academic staff college for training law faculties. The LLM and PhD programme will also commence from next academic session", he added.

The vice-chancellor said a memorandum of understanding will be signed with foreign universities and government-run national law schools so that students can be sent to other leading law institutes as part of exchange programmes.

Officer on special duty Virendra Mittal said an attempt is being made to shift the National Law University, Assam to permanent campus at Amingaon in North Guwahati. "The total expenditure of the project in North Guwahati is about Rs 350 crores. We have already got 21 acres allotted and more land allotment process of another 26 acres would be completed by November. Order has been made for an online law library at the university," Mittal added.

Dinesh Rajpurohit, who have come all the way from Rajasthan to get enrolled in the law university says the high quality of education in the National Law Universities have brought him to Guwahati.

"To become a successful lawyer is what in my mind today. The National Law Universities are the best", he said.

Chief Justice of Gauhati High Court, Madan B Lokur is the Chancellor of National Law University of Assam.