13th February 2014

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C M Y K

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The Morung Express

Dimapur VOL. IX ISSUE 41

www.morungexpress.com

[ PAGE 8]

Nicole reveals Keith leaves her a love letter every night they are apart

Dr. S. Kemp memorial watchtower inaugurated [ PAGE 2]

In peace talks, Assad plays for time

[ PAGE 11]

[ PAGE 9]

By Sandemo Ngullie

NPF set to declare LS candidates after Feb 19 DIMAPUR, FEBRUARY 12 (NNN): The Naga People’s Front (NPF) is scheduled to declare the names of its candidates for Manipur and Nagaland after February 19, with regard to the Lok Sabha polls. NPF sources confided this to NNN on Wednesday. The Democratic Alliance of Nagaland will hold a meeting to discuss the matter on February 19.

Ao organizations demand ‘justice’

DIMAPUR, FEBRUARY 12 (MExN): The Ao Senden, Watsü Mungdang and Ao Students’ Organization have demanded answers from the Nagaland state government, as to why the July 4 Dimapur murder case is “lying dormant for so long.” A joint statement reminded that representations, regarding the case, had been submitted to the Nagaland Governor on July 22, 2013 and to the Parliamentary Secretary for Law and Justice on August 8, 2013. Despite several appeals made by various organizations to expedite the case, they expressed concern at the “total lack of concern shown by the government” to crimes against women. The Ao organizations asserted they will leave no stone unturned to see that justice is not denied, due to “lapses of the government and its law enforcing bodies.” “Let justice prevail immediately before the public demand goes beyond control,” it cautioned.

Bill for lifting of prohibition in Mizoram

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AIzAwl, FEBRUARY 12 (PTI): Mizoram Excise and Narcotics minister R. Lalzirliana today said efforts are being made to introduce the Mizoram Excise Bill, 2014 in the state assembly during the coming session, which would automatically repeal the Mizoram Liquor Total Prohibition Act, 1995. Lalzirliana told reporters that the Mizoram Excise Bill, 2014 was already drafted and was being examined by legal experts after which it would be sent to the state Law Department. “We intend to introduce the bill during the coming session of the state legislature which was scheduled to commence from March 18,” he said. He said, following the passage of the bill, wine shops would be opened in some places but bars will not be allowed. The proposed legislation would provide stringent punishment for offences regarding intoxication and liquor related crimes, he added.

–Plato

Yuvraj, Karthik big winners at IPL 7 auction [ PAGE 12]

rail Budget: fares, freight rates on hold ahead of polls

reflections

If you want to make the entire state sober, why don’t you begin with your husbands, sons, daughters, grandparents and in-laws first?

Thursday, February 13, 2014 12 pages Rs. 4

Knowledge without justice ought to be called cunning rather than wisdom

President for bringing education out of mediocrity

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NEw DElHI, FEBRUARY 12 (REUTERs): India left train fares and freight rates unchanged in its interim railway budget, as politicians try to please voters and manufacturing companies ahead of national elections due in the next three months. India’s state-owned railways are the world’s fourth-largest, with 65,000 km (40,000 miles) of track, after the United States, China and Russia, but have suffered from years of low investment and a lack of policy reforms. India last raised passenger fares in January 2013, after a nine-year gap, snapping a populist trend in order to mend the finances of a creaky rail network that drags on the economy. Railways Minister Mallikarjun Kharge said the department would rely on budgetary support as well market borrowing to invest in new tracks. “Inadequacy of financial resources is a key constraint to railways,” he said, while presenting an interim budget for the first four months of the fisMeagan Duhamel and Eric Radford of Canada compete in the pairs short program figure cal year to March 2015. Indian Railways plans skating competition at the Iceberg Skating Palace during the 2014 Winter Olympics on Tuesday in Sochi, Russia. (AP Photo) to invest 643.05 billion

railway focus on extending connectivity to north east

NEw DElHI, FEBRUARY 12 (IANs): In a bid to bring the North Eastern states within the railway network, the Indian Railways are now on course to converting or commissioning various rail lines in three states in the region - Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya, Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge said here Wednesday while presenting the interim railway budget in the Lok Sabha. The Railways are on course to converting the strategically important 510-km-

rupees on new lines and other infrastructure in the next fiscal year, up 8.3 percent from a revised figure of 593.6 billion in the current fiscal year, he said. It expects support to the tune of 302.23 billion rupees from the federal government’s budget, and plans to borrow about 198 billion from the market. In election years, India presents an interim budget to seek parliament’s approval for planned expenditure for a few months, but leaves the next government to take major policy steps in the full-year budget after the polls. The rail-

long Rangiya (Assam) to Murkongselek (Assam) metre gauge line into broad gauge within this financial year. “The capital (Itanagar) of Arunanchal Pradesh would soon be on the rail map in this financial year, as Harmuti-Naharlagun newline is expected to be commissioned shortly,” he said. The state of Meghalaya is also all set to come on the Railways map in this financial year itself, as the DudhnoiMehendipathar new line is getting completed by March 2014, he added.

way budget precedes the federal interim budget, to be presented in parliament by Finance Minister P. Chidambaram on February 17, which is likely to raise funding for some vote-winning projects while trying to rein in the fiscal deficit. In a bid to please voters, the railways minister announced 72 new trains, despite the financial woes that beset the sector. Successive governments have milked the railways to provide voters with cheaper transport and employment. The railways spend about $4 billion on passenger subsidy each year while

charging higher freight tariffs. In the past five years, it has added about 260,000 staff to rank among the world’s largest employers, with a work force of nearly 1.4 million. The railways remain India’s chief mode of long-distance travel, despite a poor safety record of more than 2,200 deaths in railway accidents in the last decade. India added just 1,750 km (1,087 miles) of new lines during the period from 2006 to 2011, compared with 14,000 km (8,699 miles) by China, auditors Ernst & Young said in a report. Detailed news on page 8

Call for changes in ‘male-dominated’ Naga society nAGAlAnD HeAltHcAre: needing Human solutions

NEw DElHI, FEBRUARY 12 (IANs): Naga activists and scholars Wednesday robustly called for changes in the maledominated society of Nagaland state, saying that it barred women from inheritance, land rights as well as political equality. “We are now fighting for our constitutional rights of representation and reservation by going to the Supreme Court,” said Rosemary Dzuvichu, associate professor at Nagaland University. Acknowledging that there were some positive developments, Dzuvichu remarked that while constitutional bodies like the state government did not implement its commitment to re-

serve 33 percent of elected posts in municipal bodies for women, traditional male-dominated groups such as the Naga Hoho also opposed it. Speaking on the second day of the international conference of ‘The Eastern Himalaya: Gender, Poverty and Livelihoods’ organized by the Centre for North East Studies and Policy Research at Jamia Millia Islamia, Monalisa Changkija, founder-editor of the Nagaland Page, remarked on the “`second-classness’ of Naga women and male-stream customary laws which restrict us”. Challenging the romantic popular concept of Naga and other tribal women being more

equal than other Indian women, Changkija, who is also a poet, declared that Naga women were “better educated, more mobile and more visible - but that does not protect us from customary law”. The intense sessions also heard from scientists, engineers, activists and civil society organizers on the Uttarakhand deluge of 2013 and the grim lessons it held for the northeastern states. Mindless “development, insensitivity to forest and mountain ecosystems and laying of infrastructure expanding dams and roads and poor governance were responsible”, they said. Traditional building structures of wood and stone were being

replaced by concrete buildings with state support without caring for safety. “Dams were buried under sediment,” said Ravi Chopra of the Peoples’ Science Institute in Dehra Dun. A pronounced feminization of agriculture as a result of migration was visible. “There is also a collapse of mountain agriculture,” he remarked, a view echoed by speakers who shared experience from Nepal, Myanmar, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Assam. Male migration is a major phenomenon with farm owners moving to cities in search of jobs, putting women under great pressure while running the farms.

Police reach out to ne people Law students in Nagaland

NEw DElHI, FEBRUARY 12 (IANs): Faced with criticism over its perceived lack of sensitivity and outreach to the northeast community in the capital, Delhi Police is set to launch a Facebook page and a Twitter account for people from the northeast where they can post complaints and suggestions. In another move, a 24-hour Delhi Police helpline will be publicized widely by their social media websites. The decision was taken by Delhi Police in the wake of an alleged “racist” attack on Arunachal Pradesh student Nido Tania that led to his death and a furor among people from the northeast region. Delhi Police already has a committee, formed in 2012 and headed by a Joint Commissioner of Police, to tackle problems faced by students and other people from the northeastern states living in Delhi. It is currently being headed by Joint Commissioner Robin Hibu, who hails from the region. “A Facebook and Twitter account of Delhi Police will be launched soon where students from the northeastern region can put forth their grievances and suggestions,” a police officer told IANS. He said the accounts will be monitored regularly by a police team with good knowledge of social media and computer handling. “Delhi Police will take note of the posts and act upon them.” “We will also post the action taken by Delhi Police on the complaints and suggestions,” he added.

Delhi Police will also publicise its 24hour helpline number - 1091 - on the website of the ministry of development of north east region (DoNER), as well as its Facebook and Twitter pages. It will also encourage northeast students to pen down their thoughts and experiences on wattpad - an online community themed around writing and story-telling on which users can post articles, stories, and poems about anything. The DoNER ministry has already launched a support centre for students from the northeast following the death of Tania. The decision was arrived at after a joint meeting between Delhi Police and officials of DoNER Feb 5, said another police official. The support centre has been opened at the NorthEast Council Guest House in Chanakyapuri in central Delhi. Professional counsellors will be hired on contractual basis to deal with problems and issues raised by northeast students at the support centre. In another step at outreach, Delhi Police is planning to conduct half-day seminars once a month that will see professional counsellors and northeast people discuss issues and problems faced by them. In this move, the DoNER ministry would also chip in. Delhi Police holds meetings once in two months with students and people from the northeast in the seven police districts of the capital. The minutes of the meetings are forwarded to Hibu and the Delhi Police commissioner, said an official.

Delhi Police’s new FB, Twitter pages for people from North East

lag behind, states NLSF

DIMAPUR, FEBRUARY 12 (MExN): The Nagaland Law Students’ Federation (NLSF) has sent a memorandum to the controller of examination and vice chancellor of Nagaland University highlighting the plight of law students in Nagaland, asking for their grievances to be addressed immediately. Following the NLSF General Assembly of all law colleges in Nagaland on February 10, the memorandum has asked the authority concerned to “declare the result of the LL.b Semester examination within 60 days of writing examination as per UGC norms.” Other grievances that the students’ body has asked for a positive response for include: to give examination routine 30 days before the commencement of semester examination, to make LL.b mark sheet computerized which is handwritten now and to set up separate Law department under Nagaland University. The memorandum has been signed by the president of NLSF, Kehounei-u and general secretary, Hotoka Zhimo. It states that it is “disheartening to note that the Law students are facing a lots of problems due to the lackadaisical attitude and step motherly treatment given to Law students of Nagaland by Nagaland University which is greatly effecting and hampering the career of the Law students.” This attitude of the University “for so many years without any response from the authority concerned,” has put students of law in Nagaland behind other universities for almost one academic year. The NLSF has thus requested the authority concerned to “take up the case with outmost sincerity and give us immediate positive response failing which Law Federation will adopt democratic means of agitation to make our voice heard.”

Abokali Jimomi Zunheboto | February 12

Even the best physicians need light to see in the dark, unless they wear futuristic night-vision goggles. To save a dying patient, they require much more. Beside knowledge, and compassion, they need equipment, medicine and, the basic, biological necessity – light, to be able to see the patient. Mid-February in Zunheboto with winter still harsh, at the Civil Hospital two years ago, a relative had delivered a child. In the same ward was another heavily pregnant woman. Fortunately for the relative, the delivery happened during daylight hours but the other woman went into pains during the night. Both the women had come to one of the only two hospitals in Zunheboto Town from nearby villages. According to the relative, her pregnant neighbour was screaming in pain and desperately wanted the doctor, “it was around 8 pm and there was no doctor. A nurse was in charge and there was no light or Inverter.” Upon contacting the absentee duty doctor, he replied that he could do nothing till the power was back. The woman narrated that the patient “frantically phoned all possible relatives in the town to get help or take her to the other hospital to see a doctor… she even called up her mother in the village to say she was about to die.” One of the patient’s relatives finally informed some doctors: two doctors (one retired and the other off duty) arrived to help and she was taken to the Operation Theatre. However, said the woman, “there was still no light, so, a frenzied hunt began for torch lights, candles and collection of all sorts of Chinese Emergency Lights the other patients had… the doctor sent a staff to one of neighbouring houses who owned a very bright solar lamp.” “Candles were lit and placed in a neat row from the corridor

leading to the Operation Room, all torch lights shone while the doctors worked… mother and baby were saved,” said the woman who, with her husband in the course of those two to three hours, “felt utterly helpless and hopeless.” She said, “we even forgot about our newborn… not knowing what to do, we just prayed and prayed that she would not die.” When it is difficult to see a doctor even when you are in a hospital, imagine the plight of not just pregnant women (there are many instances of pregnant women from villages dying enroute to hospitals), but also of many emergency medical situations in rural Nagaland. Several villages still do not have emergency medical centers: A 60+ man fell from a tree and lost consciousness. People from his village put him on a Tata Mobile and sped off to the Government hospital in Zunheboto, but having reached after sundown, there was no doctor, so they took him to the other “paid” hospital’s doctor, then brought him back to the “unpaid” one – imagine a severely injured old man, carried to and fro on a pickup truck searching for a doctor. Recently, a vehicle fell off a cliff in Kiphire; with one dead, the other survivor could be given First Aid only after reaching Zunheboto. One could say “so what?” like a young Naga once said, “It’s their fate!” If 8 out of 10 people, all living in a small house, are perpetually plagued by life-and-death situations, wouldn’t the other two’s “good fate” be disrupted? They would either have to leave the house for peace of mind or collaboratively find solutions for harmonious co-existence. As Chinua Achebe wrote, “we cannot trample upon the humanity of others without devaluing our own. The Igbo, always practical, put it concretely in their proverb Onye ji onye n’ani ji onwe ya: ‘He who will hold another down in the mud must stay in the mud to keep him down.’”

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