IMPHAL | FEBRUARY 17 : The counting for the February 14 by-election to Manipur's Konthoujam assembly constituency has been declared. Trinamool Congress has emerged the unexpected victor. If any semblance is to be drawn between the “Jasmine Revolution” that is sweeping the Arab world with the outcome of the by-election at home, it is the yearning for change.
The blow that the Congress has been subjected to in the by-election is expected to have a far reaching political ramification in the state. Manipur has been ruled like a fiefdom by the Congress led Secular Progressive Front (SPF) coalition government since the year 2002. The gargantuan Congress appears to have suffered cracks lately primarily because it has refused to feel the pulse of the people on whom its writ loomed supreme. The people are quick to read the sign of betrayal.
The chief minister and his deputies are perhaps trying to figure out what went terribly wrong in the winnable by-election which was termed by the compulsively optimistic Congressmen as a forgone conclusion.
Today’s insulting result is one of the most worrying factors in the party’s circle given that the state is all set to be thrown into the whirlpool of assembly election early next year—political rumor has it that the elections may be preponed in the later part of the year. Especially so with the chief minister O Ibobi Singh himself cautioning his partymen that the by-election will be the benchmark of the shape of things to come in the upcoming assembly elections.
The victory of K. Sarat of Trinamool Congress can not be an isolated phenomenon. It has to be read coterminous with the aspirations of the people of the state and the nature of governance Ibobi led dispensation has become synonymous with. The BJP has held the SPF government accountable to public fund embezzlement running over 10,000 crore. The citizens have become united under several dozen committees and organizations in protest against the government.
The teachers are not happy because the government they say is discriminating their lot by refusing revised central 6th pay commission recommendation. The students are aggrieved because their teachers have been striking work and refusing them the right to education. The tribals attempt to see some short of Machiavellian intention to government’s approaches. The drivers are sad that they are not provided security while ferrying goods from outside the state. The general population is weary of the absence of basic amenities like water, power and the abundance of bombs and violence. PDS items are not satisfactorily distributed; the roads in Imphal are chockablock with long line of vehicular traffic.
To add more to the nightmare of the already worried Ibobi, the people have now found a renewed sense of activism. They are not merely happy playing to the gallery or the grandstand, they now want to be the main actor: they want their voices to be heard and heard well at that.
The Autonomous District Council elections—held mid last year after resurrecting it from being stashed away for more than a decade in cold storage—looked like a cake walk for the Congress with the party sweeping the hill districts in the local bodies despite opposition from some Naga bodies. The Congress began to wear soil cloths of complacency not realizing that the elections were rigged to the bare bone of democracy.
Similarly, elections to local municipality and panchayats were garnered away by the Congress without much ado. All this was possible apparently because the Congress made used of their expertise in “money power” which its rival political parties have written off as having outlived its utility and its power.
The Congress has also been blamed of furthering dynastic politics which the local politicians have grown to calling it “die-in-harness” politics. For instance, the ongoing 9th Manipur legislative assembly has already been burdened with four by-elections, including the just concluded Konthoujam by-election, owing to the deaths of the sitting MLAs in Khundrakpam, Moirang and Yaiskul assembly constituencies. In all the earlier three by-elections the Congress had managed to reinstate their supremacy by defeating their rivals. But the by-election in Konthoujam assembly constituency has come as a major shocker and perhaps a game changer for other parties to show that they mean business when they say that the Congress must take a long walk out of power.
However, the most significant of all the causes of the defeat of the once supreme Congress is the force that was built from the remnants of the defeated wounds into anti-Congress encore. Although the unity of all political parties who are against the Congress is incomplete, yet a beginning has already been made to lay at rest the Congress in its sarcophagus of history, as was predicted during pre-election campaigns by rival parties.
Anti-government forces have already begun to question the longevity of Congress in politics but political pundits are waiting to pass their comments, only beginning to make sense of the possible political churning that is awaiting Manipur to usher its people to a new era of peace and prosperity. After about a decade, a sense of the existence of other political parties have become a political reality; will the ragtag bunch of political parties with their “like-minded” and “anti-Congress” chorus able to deliver? Will they be able to steer clear of their ideological and strategic differences in hammering out a unity that will take on the mighty Congress in the elections next year? May be they will!
The blow that the Congress has been subjected to in the by-election is expected to have a far reaching political ramification in the state. Manipur has been ruled like a fiefdom by the Congress led Secular Progressive Front (SPF) coalition government since the year 2002. The gargantuan Congress appears to have suffered cracks lately primarily because it has refused to feel the pulse of the people on whom its writ loomed supreme. The people are quick to read the sign of betrayal.
The chief minister and his deputies are perhaps trying to figure out what went terribly wrong in the winnable by-election which was termed by the compulsively optimistic Congressmen as a forgone conclusion.
Today’s insulting result is one of the most worrying factors in the party’s circle given that the state is all set to be thrown into the whirlpool of assembly election early next year—political rumor has it that the elections may be preponed in the later part of the year. Especially so with the chief minister O Ibobi Singh himself cautioning his partymen that the by-election will be the benchmark of the shape of things to come in the upcoming assembly elections.
The victory of K. Sarat of Trinamool Congress can not be an isolated phenomenon. It has to be read coterminous with the aspirations of the people of the state and the nature of governance Ibobi led dispensation has become synonymous with. The BJP has held the SPF government accountable to public fund embezzlement running over 10,000 crore. The citizens have become united under several dozen committees and organizations in protest against the government.
The teachers are not happy because the government they say is discriminating their lot by refusing revised central 6th pay commission recommendation. The students are aggrieved because their teachers have been striking work and refusing them the right to education. The tribals attempt to see some short of Machiavellian intention to government’s approaches. The drivers are sad that they are not provided security while ferrying goods from outside the state. The general population is weary of the absence of basic amenities like water, power and the abundance of bombs and violence. PDS items are not satisfactorily distributed; the roads in Imphal are chockablock with long line of vehicular traffic.
To add more to the nightmare of the already worried Ibobi, the people have now found a renewed sense of activism. They are not merely happy playing to the gallery or the grandstand, they now want to be the main actor: they want their voices to be heard and heard well at that.
The Autonomous District Council elections—held mid last year after resurrecting it from being stashed away for more than a decade in cold storage—looked like a cake walk for the Congress with the party sweeping the hill districts in the local bodies despite opposition from some Naga bodies. The Congress began to wear soil cloths of complacency not realizing that the elections were rigged to the bare bone of democracy.
Similarly, elections to local municipality and panchayats were garnered away by the Congress without much ado. All this was possible apparently because the Congress made used of their expertise in “money power” which its rival political parties have written off as having outlived its utility and its power.
The Congress has also been blamed of furthering dynastic politics which the local politicians have grown to calling it “die-in-harness” politics. For instance, the ongoing 9th Manipur legislative assembly has already been burdened with four by-elections, including the just concluded Konthoujam by-election, owing to the deaths of the sitting MLAs in Khundrakpam, Moirang and Yaiskul assembly constituencies. In all the earlier three by-elections the Congress had managed to reinstate their supremacy by defeating their rivals. But the by-election in Konthoujam assembly constituency has come as a major shocker and perhaps a game changer for other parties to show that they mean business when they say that the Congress must take a long walk out of power.
However, the most significant of all the causes of the defeat of the once supreme Congress is the force that was built from the remnants of the defeated wounds into anti-Congress encore. Although the unity of all political parties who are against the Congress is incomplete, yet a beginning has already been made to lay at rest the Congress in its sarcophagus of history, as was predicted during pre-election campaigns by rival parties.
Anti-government forces have already begun to question the longevity of Congress in politics but political pundits are waiting to pass their comments, only beginning to make sense of the possible political churning that is awaiting Manipur to usher its people to a new era of peace and prosperity. After about a decade, a sense of the existence of other political parties have become a political reality; will the ragtag bunch of political parties with their “like-minded” and “anti-Congress” chorus able to deliver? Will they be able to steer clear of their ideological and strategic differences in hammering out a unity that will take on the mighty Congress in the elections next year? May be they will!
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