Kangleimaichou

They called it Durga Iratpa . In a makeshift shrine on a corner a flimsy image of lady Durga is pasted on a wooden frame. Before it are stacked-up books and offerings. The books are placed with the belief that they can be blessed and it will make easier for the devotees to read and understand. A simple belief, but what startles one is the inclusion of thievery and acceptance; during this weeklong celebration stealing of offerings from others’ makeshift shrines is religiously tolerated. As elders in localaties didn't miss such mischief they all say “ it’s durga iratpa, let them have some fun.” And then on the last day of the celebration people turn the devotees turn stern and cleansed after a bath and in clean clothes. They take pride in the slaughtering of vermilion-smeared animals. Here money determines the sizes of the smeared animals; big groups with money would slaughter goats and buffaloes , those right below them would contain themselves with butc...

Knowing they have also something of their own but being unable to look at through a keen eye like they are required to do in their attempt to read  others' history. This conscious negligence and absence take away the pride that must have sprouted in them and forced them to embrace others' which they can hardly comprehend.  At homes they all pretend what they have embraced is really theirs, but their borrowed ideas which they haven’t examined only belittle them when they go and try to mingle with others. It is like forcing themselves to embrace that English culture should be theirs and whatever the British do should be exactly followed. When people become a mimic kind they cease to think and ask, they only look at what is thrown before their eyes and sniff, much like a dog would do, at it with great display of interest even though they have no idea what object are thrown at. It could English faeces. The maichou once said, “Children when we look at someone from an...

He does not even have enough money to bribe the cops to make them arrest the man who has eloped with his underage daughter. He can no longer walk about the town with an already-eloped daughter at home about whom people have become quite inquisitive. But he cannot afford to lose his face; soon the daughter is married off with three truck-load of dowry. Some loud-mouthed in the village says “ they should have given a ready-made house and a magical lamp  as well, so that they can spend the rest of their life on fornicating to breed and breed.” Few months after the he married off his underage daughter with truckloads of dowry just to save his face the man was accepted by his friends with whom he sits every morning talking this family and that family and sometimes about local politics in E-neh Chaobi’s tea stall.  Eneh Chaobi’s stall possesses no pieces of furniture, except for a morah (footstooll) on which the old and wrinkled lady sits by the earthen hearth.  Most...

There was nothing that Tonton’s wouldn’t do to be at where the successful few from his town are.  One among the few is the pock-marked face Tamo Ningthem ,always chewing betel nuts. Whenever he sees a teenage boy with a pimply face he will stop him and start a warm conversation, and after a while he will begin talking about the face saying he can do something. He enjoys pricking and squeezing such a face. After he has stained his own hands with the boy’s blood he will say more nice things about him and his family and will let go of the young person.  He tried to build a four-storeyed house in the town, but couldn’t finish it.  Such a building stands out in a village like ours where most of the houses are either of whitewashed mud walls and the structures supported by wooden frames roofed with bright corrugated iron sheets or thatch and the mud walls plastered with cow dung and soft sand from the bank of the sullen Imphal River. What is modern about the place i...

Moinah Hainareeseh chumbah tai     Chumdanahboo Hairee Nattro Makhoidee achumbata adoom ngangedaineh Adunabu phee faoba machoo sungsinlidunee Machoo khudimak achumbagee machunee Houjiktee hainadrasu yareh haibaneeh Mee faoba makhoigee machu oikrabaneeh Wakhal managadabaneeh Manadragadeeh karam haina mai paktoinoh Phourah mook paklenah haidaineh houjikteeh Thagatneengainee sigumbasidee Akeeba kharanadee telangkadounadee wanghuloonohnah hainei Machu phungeh maanare Mai fhange phourah mook pakleh Telangkadounahsu wangnaa paireh Sigumbaseedee amookta thoktreeba thoudoknee Ado meena khangdabagee wadanee Khangnaba hotnade haibadee langanee hai Adoonaboo pao sundoknaba meeramdaa thadokkhree mayamseedee Khanganee ooranee soidana  Khaangbata kanbeeyoo Tumeenaa mangol chanbeeyoo Mattam kharatagee waanee keidourageh

What is art? And how does an artist employ art and for what purpose? If one employs art for a farcical objective it would it hardly endure time, if it were employed to achieve some narrow political, in an inevitable situation, objective it would end up as a mere pamphlet, something crafty individuals soaked in verbosity would do to serve their political objective.  The objectives of art are always broad and its efforts are empathetic and richly humane to its core. It can never be art and at the same time a brutal force serving only a certain section's interest. It takes no side and it has neither friends nor foes and its fight is the relentless struggle to master the craft itself. Few days ago I happened to glance at few lines on the film industry in my home state; there were talks about what needful should be done to improve the so-called art in that industry. Without listening to and reading the critics' comments I could conclude: the industry is sufferin...