Irom Sharmila’s 16-year-long peaceful hungerstrike to protest against State violence in the form of removal of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, despite the fact that she chose to end it earlier
Irom Sharmila’s 16-year-long peaceful hungerstrike to protest against State violence in the form of removal of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, despite the fact that she chose to end it earlier this week, makes her a living modern legend. It simply doesn’t matter that her campaign hadn’t succeeded, and the chances of AFSPA being remote from the statute book any time in the near future is remote, to say the least. However, her epic fast for a major cause against the State is unique. This alone gives Sharmila an exalted status in the roll call of honour over non-violent resistance.
A defiant fast is a deeply political instrument. Sharmila tried it unsuccessfully, but her individual effort shines. She showed she had no hesitation in courting death by refusing food for long. She says she remains steadfast on her cause and voiced the wish to change tack and try another way — by becoming a non-party legislator to promote her cause from inside the precincts of the Manipur Assembly. Sharmila, now 44, also wants to marry.
Manipur’s “Iron Lady” created the blockbuster fast and has now seen it fit to end it to mark a change in tactics. But instead of respecting her wishes as an individual, and expressing appreciation for the intensity with which the anti-AFSPA battle was fought single-handedly by a woman in a stunningly demonstrative manner, Sharmila’s immediate community in Imphal — her friends, even her family — have shown they are displeased with her move. The great fighter can’t return to her mother’s home from where she began her incredible journey, presumably for want of welcome.
Evidently, Sharmila’s erstwhile passionate supporters want her to carry on being a saint in their midst, and refuse to see her in any other way. This is typical of the subcontinent where fasting is a religio-cultural act. It is worth asking if Mahatma Gandhi would have been seen as great if he didn’t have fasting as the principal weapon in his satyagraha armoury.
There’s also a little hypocrisy in the response of Irom Sharmila’s supporters. They would like someone else to die for their cause as they go about their lives. In an insurgency-wracked state like Manipur, the possibility that sections of militants have “suggested” the “people’s response” to Sharmila’s decision to the “people” can’t be ruled out. Even when no overt threats are made, indirect hints to fall in line are a common enough occurrence in states hit by militancy, like Manipur and Kashmir.
Of course, we don’t really know the truth in this case. But it’s good to record that outside her immediate circle, Sharmila’s status as a doughty warrior of sterling timber for a cause relating to ordinary people is assured.
