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The Morung Express
Dimapur VOL. IX ISSUE 305
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Contemplation is the highest form of activity
A vanishing tribe on the fringes of Karnataka forests
reflections
By Sandemo Ngullie
New Delhi | November 4
Power shut down from Nov 6 Dimapur, November 4 (mexN): Major maintenance work will be carried out at the Metha Sub-Station for overhauling of CB, Panel etc. for which there will be shut down of power supply from 6:00am10:00am and 2:00pm4:00pm from November 6 onwards till the completion of the work. The feeders that will be affected: Town Feeder, PWD Feeder, Dhobinalla Feeder, Court Feeder, DBC Feeder, Thahekhu Feeder and the colonies receiving power supply from Metha Sub-Station. This was informed in a press release by Dimapur Electrical Division Executive Engineer, Er. Moameren.
Meeting on Ebola postponed to Nov 11 Kohima, November 4 (Dipr): The Home Department, Government of Nagaland, has informed all concerned that the meeting in connection with discussion about precautionary measures for Ebola which was fixed for November 5 at 3:00pm in the office chamber of Principal Secretary (Home) has been postponed to November 11 at 12:00 pm. This was informed in a circular by Principal Secretary to the Government of Nagaland, Pankaj Kumar.
Govt. to clear pending bills
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Kohima, November 4 (Dipr): The Government of Nagaland has decided to ‘clear immediately’ the “pending bills under the various departments,” informed a press note from the DIPR. Chief Secretary Nagaland, Toshi Aier, held a meeting with AHODs and HODs at the Secretariat Conference Hall on November 4, and also decided that “all departments shall submit proposals to the Finance department for drawal authority, latest by November 15, 2014 with intimation to the office of the Chief Secretary and Home Commissioner.” The meeting also decided to constitute a Special Committee to examine the enforcement of Government policy and rules on Government Advertisements. The official spokesperson or department for all Government Press Releases shall also be finalized by the Committee.
WHO admits botching response to Ebola [ PAGE 09]
Elano helps Chennayin draw against Atletico [ PAGE 12]
india plans to step up safety on world’s most ‘dangerous’ roads Reuters
“No effigy of Robert Vadra?Aree,Look.If you want your business to flourish and lead the competitive market,Stay in touch with politics.
–Aristotle
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[ PAGE 11]
[ PAGE 08]
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Wednesday, November 5, 2014 12 pages Rs. 4
Art & Culture dept celebrates golden jubilee
Priscilla Presley: Elvis was the ‘real deal’
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This year, the family of Rakesh Pillai, a bank employee, achieved a longheld aspiration. After hauling themselves around on bicycles and scooters all their lives, they bought one of India’s best-selling compact cars. It didn’t matter that no family member knew how to drive. Pillai immediately took the car for a spin around his neighbourhood in New Delhi. He almost knocked down a couple of pedestrians, scratched a car door on a gate when making a turn, and bumped a wall while trying to reverse. “In India, the main rule for most drivers is that you don’t stop for anyone,” said Pillai, 31, who wears frameless glasses and sports a neatly trimmed moustache. “Cars don’t stop for walkers, and walkers don’t stop for cars.” India has the world’s deadliest roads, the result of a flood of untrained drivers, inadequate law enforcement, badly maintained highways and cars that fail modern crash tests. Alarmed by the increasing fatalities, the new government has begun a five-year project to cut road deaths by a fifth every year, part of the most ambitious overhaul of highway laws since independence in 1947. About 1.2 million
Indians were killed in car accidents over the past decade, on average one every four minutes, while 5.5 million were seriously injured. While road deaths in many emerging markets have dipped even as vehicle sales rose, Indian fatalities have shot up by half in the last 10 years. The government is proposing a drastic increase in fines and prison sentences for dangerous driving. It will create an authority with a sole focus on road safety, impose stricter regulations on car manufacturers, and employ technology, such as automated driving tests, to cut down on corruption. Drivers caught speeding or who drink and drive will face a fine of Rs. 50,000 - 10 times the average monthly salary - and the threat of jail. The current maximum fine for speeding is Rs. 1000 and for drink driving Rs. 3000. “It is not going to change road habits overnight, and any success will depend on a lot of work from the government to ensure these laws are implemented,” said Piyush Tewari, who founded the SaveLIFE Foundation to reduce accidents after his teenage cousin was killed in a crash. TEN AT A TIME At a test centre in Delhi last week, Pillai stood in a queue that snaked outside into the autumn sunshine,
where touts told candidates they could skip the line and the test for a fee of about Rs. 2000. After an hour, Pillai was called for his test on a busy road near a shopping mall. It involved driving in a straight line, pulling into a righthand lane, making a U-turn and then another, before arriving back at the start. It took all of 90 seconds. The examiner, standing under an umbrella, didn’t get into the car and tried to keep track of more than 10 vehicles and motorbikes taking the test at the same time. India has one the world’s fastest-growing car markets, with two million sold every year. In a nation of new drivers, much of the road etiquette has come from how people walk. Drivers seize any space in front of them and tailgate whenever possible. On the highway, if drivers miss a turn, they stop, back up and try again. India has few drivers relative to its population, with just 41 automobiles for every 1,000 people. That is roughly equivalent to the figure for the United States in 1917. But the numbers promise to keep soaring.”Sadly, I predict we are going to keep seeing a spiral in road deaths,” said Harman Singh, of safety campaign group Arrive Safe. “It is easier to pass a law than to change the mindset.”
Kuineile Newme (60) from Lodiram village in Haflong, Dima Hasao, Assam, has been selling vegetables for the past 6 years, before which she used to weave for commercial purposes till her back could sustain it no more. Her husband is in government service but has not been paid, like nearly 3000 other government workers, for 11 months now by the Dima Hasao Autonomous Council. Her market day begins at 8am, ends at 8pm. On a good day, she makes a profit of Rs. 500, but an average of Rs. 200-300 generally comes in. “Please pray that my children get jobs so I can stop working in the market..I tire quickly these days,” says Kuineile, while transacting a ginger deal with a customer. (Morung Photo)
NNC appeals for peace AnsWfseA sit-in protest called off Kohima, November 4 (mexN): The Naga National Council (NNC) has appealed to both GPRN/NSCN and NSCN (K) “not to create further unwanted situation in the Homeland for the sake of peace and tranquility among the Nagas especially the National workers.” A press note from the Information & Publicity Wing of the NNC reminded the two groups that “our future for freedom is very important and the Naga people only long for peace and Naga National Unity at this very juncture.” It asked both parties to “listen and obey the sincere and honest voice of the people for peace in the land” since the people in are “really fed up and hate infighting.”
Kohima, November 4 (mexN): The proposed sit-in protest by ANSWFSEA has been called off after an intervention by the Minister, the Secretary and the Director of Social Welfare Department with a request to the Association to refrain from agitation for 4 months during which the Department would approach various authority for “favorable action and no fresh appointment would be made at the CDPO/equivalent level.” This was informed in a press release by press in-charge of AN-
SWFSEA, Benjamin Sema. It was also informed that a decision to this effect was mutually agreed upon in good faith after “thorough, free and frank exchange of views” among the officials and the Association members at the office of the Minister, Social Welfare at the Secretariat, Kohima, on November 3. The Executive Members of the ANSWFSEA have expressed regret for the inconveniences to its members and conveyed that “now the ball is in the court of the Government of the day.”
Terra Madre: Promoting sustainable indigenous food production Kolkata on high alert Morung Express Feature Dimapur | November 4
Terra Madre is an international network uniting food producers, fishers, breeders, chefs, academics, young people, NGOs and representatives of local communities− all working to establish a system of good, clean and fair food from the grassroots level with the goal of preserving taste and biodiversity. The 6th edition titled “Salone Del Gusto and Terra Madre” was held from October 23-27, where delegates from 150 countries converged at the Italian cultural city, Turin. At the convention, Nagaland was represented by Joel Basumatari, the Head Chef of Smoke Joe’s Restaurant & Grill, Dimapur. He was part of 12 contingents of North East Slow Food & Agro- Biodiversity
Society (NEFAS), based in Shillong, which represented India. Basumatari said that his participation was enabled with the support of Chief minister of Nagaland, T R Zeliang, Principal Secretary, Temjen Toy, and Commissioner Secretary of Tourism, Himato Zhimomi. In the section called “taste innovation” conference, Joel spoke on using local ingredients; local product and the idea behind creating something different in the plate. He also highlighted the type of ingredients that the Nagaland has to offer to the world. Talking to The Morung Express, he said that people from around the world renewed the excitement of cataloguing their traditional food products for protection by nominating hundreds of new products for the “Ark of Taste project” which al-
Monkeys spreading malaria in Malaysia! KuaLa Lumpur, November 4 (iaNS): The majority of malaria hospitalisations in Malaysia are now caused by a dangerous and potentially deadly monkey-borne parasite once rarely seen in humans, according to a research by a Malaysiabased Indian scholar. Deforestation is the potential culprit in a growing number of infections that could allow this virulent malaria strain to jump from macaque monkeys to human hosts, showed the research. “This is a form of malaria that was once rarely seen in people, but today, in some remote areas of the country, all of the indigenous malaria cases we are seeing are caused by the P. knowlesi parasite,” said Balbir Singh, director, Malaria Research Centre at University of Malaysia, Sarawak. “If the number of cases continue to
increase, human-to-human transmission by mosquitoes becomes possible. In fact, this may already have happened, which would allow P. knowlesi malaria to spread more easily throughout southeast Asia,” cautioned Singh. The infections are concentrated in areas of Malaysia where over the last decade massive loss of native forest to timber and palm oil production has led to substantially increased human interactions with macaques, the research showed. That puts knowlesi malaria in the elite group of emerging and re-emerging diseases - including Ebola and AIDS - that are being passed from animals to humans as development peels back more and more layers of tropical forest previously uninhabited by humans, pointed out the research.
lowed the small-scale producers to tell the extraordinary stories related to their product. In the section, Joel presented traditional products from Nagaland such as Anishi (Dried Yam Leaves), Spring Rock Salt, Bamboo Shoots (wet and dry), Jobs Tears (Indigenous to North East), edible spiders, local banana chips, indigenous Naga pig (Tenyi-vo), local sesame paste and seeds, allium-chinisis (Khuvie), mechanga seeds (zanthozylum rhesta), and Thanamir Apple among other things. As a food connoisseur as well as an upcoming chef with active interest preserving and promoting indigenous Naga products, Joel explained that the project was an “eye opener” for him to different food cultures around the world and allowed him to meet different people and share ideas and create food
networks. The NESFAS also opened a gallery highlighting the various products indigenous to Nagaland and North East and give visitors the local narratives behind those products and the ingredients that were used in the product. Asked about the response to their products, Joel stated that they were “receptive, inquisitive and curious” and particularly commented on its “unique” taste. “Some items were too ‘unique’ for their taste buds,” he cheekily maintained. The convention was visited by more than 220,000 visitors this year. He further informed that next year ‘Indigenous Terra Madre’ will be held at Mawphlang, Meghalaya in the first week of November 2015 which will solely exhibit the indigenous community products from the region.
Intel warns of possible attack
KoLKaTa, November 4 (pTi): Central intelligence agencies have alerted Kolkata police about the possibility of a terror attack in the city, especially in the port area, a senior official of Kolkata police said on Tuesday. “We have received inputs from central intelligence agencies that there might be a terror attack in Kolkata, especially in port area. We have increased security in the port area and have put the entire city under security blanket,” a senior police officer said on condition of anonymity. According to the input, terrorists might carry out an attack in port area and may also use small boats to carry out the attack, he added. Meanwhile, two Navy warships, which were scheduled to be berthed at Khidderpore dock here till November 7 for public visits, were on Tuesday withdrawn to the sea for undisclosed ‘operational reasons,’ a defence ministry official said. The recall of warships INS Khukri and INS Sumitra came in the backdrop of the alert by central intelligence agencies to the Kolkata police about the possibility of a terror attack in the city, especially in the port area.
From Rice Beer to East Pakistan
Former Naga Army soldier Khatsümvü Zirü recollects history Vibi Yhokha Kohima | November 4
It was on a sunny afternoon in the fields of Tuophema village, Kohima that Khatsümvü Zirü and a friend were planning on drinking their rice beer after a hard day’s work when word came that the Naga Army was in dire need of soldiers. Some villagers from Kohima village had been captured by the Indian Army in Gariphema which had created further clashes in their area. A young Khatsümvü, who had desperately wanted to join the struggle then, took the opportunity and voluntarily joined the day itself, a decision he has never regretted.
Khatsümvü was a part of bailed out with the help of his the ten Naga Army groups who wife who had been pleading him were trained in East Pakistan to give up the struggle. Yet, he from 1962 to 1968. They trav- went underground again. After elled from Burma some months he to East Pakistan by would soon come boats for around over ground for 15 days. Although good for the sake he cannot recolof his family. lect the year he H u n g e r, went to East Pakiaccording to stan, one thing he Khatsümvü, was remembers is that the hardest part the trip would be of being in the the first time he struggle. He was laid his hands on one among the ‘foreign guns.’ On Naga armies who their way back to starved for days Nagaland, they on end. The InKhatsümvü Zirü carried weapons dian Army would and amenities provided which often capture and destroy vilweighed more than 30kg. The lages which put an end to their situation was worse on their re- ration supply. He also recalls turn home; he was later jailed their stays in Burma where they and tortured for one month in ground dry coffee beans and Chiechama village. He was soon drank it since there was no tea.
But one of the most lonesome days was the time when he would see the ripe paddy fields and he would think of his family and friends; how he’d wished he was also working with them in the fields and harvesting the crops. Soon after coming over ground, he took up his old profession of farming to take care of his family. His biggest regret is illiteracy, he says, and more so because he could not write down his days in the Naga Freedom struggle. The passion, as he narrates his story, is lucid. Khatsümvü does not know how old he is now, nor does he have any idea which year he joined the movement, but he would always remember that sunny afternoon in the fields of Tuophema when he and a friend had planned to drink rice beer, and instead joined the Naga struggle for freedom.
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