"contestation" of power and everyday in Manipur

Apart from the newspapers, official records and reports, the “contestation” of sovereignty in Manipur is registered and circulated as rumors, jokes and humors etc. The stories are often about people’s encounter with the Indian Armed Forces or the militant groups. And these encounters are almost always at the expense of the physical comforts of the individual involved. The stories by itself are tragic. But the fact that these narratives are circulated and repeated as humorous or jokes is very intriguing. In analyzing the “white man” jokes among the Western Apache, Basso (1979:37) frames jokes thus,

“Acts of joking convey messages that are not conveyed when the acts they are patterned after are performed unjokingly and for this reasons jokes are not intended to be taken “seriously”.. in the event they are [taken literally], [they] stand open to interpretations…the social consequences of such interpretations may be sharply disruptive..”

In the jokes I have analyzed below, the butt of the joke is often always an abstract, impersonal third person. When the joke is taken literally, the story is tragic – in the sense that the text usually ends with physical injury to the central character. Since the butt or object of the joke is an abstract third person the ‘disruptive’ consequences that Basso alludes to hardly arises, however the joke may cease to be a joke when taken literally. In cases where the object of the joke overlaps with the listener, thereby the listener becoming the butt of the joke, it might give rise to a tense situation between the narrator and the listener.

More than the content (the text) of these jokes, I think, it is structure and context of the narrative that makes it identifiable as a joke. The “historic” setting of the event (referred to in the joke) and ‘contextualizing cues’ (Gumperz [1992]) are very crucial parts of the joke. The narrator usually starts with the recounting of the “historical” situation, often with the approving acknowledgement from the listeners that the event “did” happened, in which the particular event he is narrating ‘occurred’. Once this initial “setting” is accomplished, the narrator proceeds to tell the particular event, usually after a brief pause. The event described is usually about an encounter with the third person and the personals of the Indian Army or the cadres of the militant nationalist groups. The individual members of the Indian Army as well as the militant nationalist groups are always referred to by collective nouns, Army and Naharol[1], respectively. The encounter between the Army or Naharol with the butt of the joke leads to some kind of a confrontation, leading to the final act when violence is “inflicted” on the body of the butt. Sometimes the act of violence is explicit in the text, and at other times it is either “understood” or completed with extralinguistic signs like gesturing the hand “as if” slapping the butt of the joke, or simply making the sound of the “slap” or both simultaneously. When the narrator takes the role of the Army. Naharol or the butt, there is marked switching of tone and accent. The Army always “speaks” in Hindi and the Naharol has a sarcastic tone of “respect”[2]. In both cases the pitch of the voice is higher, assertive and authoritative. The butt “speaks” usually matter-of-factly (flat intonation) or submissively.

(i) Rambo

The initial Rambo trilogy was very popular in Manipur in the 80s and 90s, and it still is. When I grew up, the iconic picture of Rambo – a muscular, half naked Sylvester Stallone, with a big gun, his eyes looking menacingly into the camera, and his long hair[3] falling down the shoulder – could be seen posted in may houses, especially in men’s rooms. And this particular story came out of the many frequent encounters with the Indian Army during “combing operations.”[4]

During a combing operation, the Army found this young man, with a long hair, in his room and the room had a picture of Rambo. So the Army caught hold of his hair, saying, “Kya Rambo banta hai?”(So you wanna be Rambo?) [At this point it is usually assumed that the young man gets a slap or a kick. Sometimes that is made explicit in the narration and at other times, it is thought to be understood]

(ii) “Human barometer”

This one des not quite fit within the genre of joke, in the sense that it does not tell any particular story as such. Rather, it is expressed reflectively upon a situation created by the Combing Operations. The Combing Operations following an attack or an ambush by the militant is often very intense and brutal. It usually involves lining up the men in the vicinity and beating them with sticks, or with boots or the butts of the guns. And because market centers are often the targets of urban guerrilla warfare, the men in and around the market area get a regular share of the beatings from the Army. At some point in the late 90s people started humoring themselves about how the bodies of those, who has had a regular share of Army beating, have developed certain sensitivities (in the form of body pain and ache) towards the change in atmospheric pressure – the body begins to ache at different parts as the clouds gather to rain or something like that.

(iii) Pheiganda nongmei maru (Bullet in the thigh)

The militant nationalist groups have declared been numerous “wars” on drug and drug abuse. Part of the drive was to clean up the Manipuri society by getting rid of the delinquent bodies. One common “punishment” for drug abusers/addicts was to shoot at the thigh, usually preceded by verbal warnings.

There was a young drug addict, who had already been shot (on the left thigh) after repeated warnings by the naharols. He was barely recovering from the wound when he was caught using drugs again. Before he could be told anything, he voluntary points to his right thigh and says, “Here, the left one has been shot.”

(iv) Longdao (Backstroke)

Another common “punishment” for drunks, especially the ones found loitering in the streets at night, was to make the drunk guys take a dip or swim in the local ponds. One such “swimming” session was going on one night. It was getting late, so the naharols told the drunk swimmers to come out of the pool and go home, warning them not repeat (the drinking) again in the future. Everyone came out one by one, except for one. So the naharol told him, “Ok, come out, time to go home.” But he won’t come out, instead he shouted back, “I would rather do another round of backstroke.” Well he was pulled out of the pond and shot at the thigh for trying to be so smart.

(v) Khudai[5]

90s was a period of intense and frequent combing operations at Kakching, my hometown. The rumor at the time was that wearing khudai, because it is mostly worn only in and around the house, was a good alibi to “prove” your innocence during the operations. So that if you were found wearing a khudai during the operation, you are more likely to be drawing less scrutiny from the Army. Jokes were around at the time about how someone or the other is always in his khudai.

(vi) Kya tera mera?

Random security checks in the middle of the road are a permanent feature of everyday life in contemporary Manipur. One such security check surprised a man name Mera[6], a common name in Manipur, coming from a village called Tera[7].

“Tera naam kya hai?” (What is your name?)

“Mera”

“Kahase aa rahey ho?” (Where are you coming from?)

“Tera”

[By this time the Army explodes with anger]

“Kya tera mera?” (What “your”, “mine”?!!)

At this point, the Army is again understood as slapping Mera, the guy, across the face, as the Army explodes with irritation.

(vii) Mayang Tanbada Yaoba

A while ago I have described how the figure of Mayang becomes the target for the militant groups. There has been certain instances of Mayangs being physically evicted, threaten to leave, and even killed. “Mayang Tanbada Yaoba” refers to someone who was evicted as part of the “Mayang Tanba” (Drive away Mayang) associated with such threats. The butt of the joke is someone who “resembles” a Mayang, particularly bearing certain physical features like dark skin, wide eyes etc. It is almost always addressed to a male. There are different versions to this expression often improvising on the “circumstances” in which the butt of the joke might have been “rescued” from the naharols who were trying to physically evict him as Mayang despite his protest that he was not.

Conclusion

I see these jokes and humorous narratives as not just registers of people’s encounters with the two dominant forms of powers in the everyday lives but also as a “social commentary” on the lived experience under the two power regimes. In this sense of resisting powers (by speaking “back”), these narratives could be read as ‘expressive resistance’ –

“Such expressive resistance is more likely to be diagnostic of a situation than prognostic of change. It at least testifies that the writ of an alien presentation of self does not run unchallenged, that the hegemony of bureaucratic order is actively mocked. But such forms of expressions may be forerunners of change and need to be considered in that larger context.” (Hymes [1979])[8]

In other words, these narratives are “good to think” about the lived experience of the people under the shadow of two dominant power regimes “contesting” over spaces, bodies, symbols etc. The Indian Army or the militant nationalist groups are not exactly an “alien” in the sense of the “West” presenting itself in a “non-Western world”, the context in which Hymes has referred to the term “alien” here. However, if we “reduce” both these dominant power regimes to their basic logic – the logic of the nation-state – Hymes’ words begin to fit better. Then, I think, it is nationalism – as the logic of nation-state – that is being mocked at in the humorous narratives presented here. The mockery is, perhaps, about the tragic absurdity of the “normalizing” practices that nationalism necessitates.

Terms like “Mayang”, though a common usage signifying a difference, cannot be codified as a “foreign” body, distinct from the “local” (becoming legible to logic of the nation-state), thereby lending itself to be removed, without the risk of removing parts of the “local”. Perhaps, this is what joke (vii) is hinting at. On the other hand, in jokes (i), (ii), (v) and (vi) we are reminded of the absurdities of defining “insurgent” bodies and “civil” bodies, and the meanings often lost in translations. The resentment implicit in the “apparent” complicity of the “disciplining/punishing” doctored by the militant nationalist groups to “cleanse” Manipuri society of delinquent bodies and practices is captured well in jokes (iii) and (iv). These narratives are not just “good to think” about, but everyday practices, “kind of micro-sociological analysis”(Basso [1979:17]) engaged with a “complex” situation of living.

Thus these narratives are cues to understand why the nationalist claims (by both the Indian state as well as the militant nationalist groups) over history [eg. The “merger”], space [Kangla, Shaheed Park, cinema halls etc. ], time [Black Day, Patriot’s Day etc] or bodies [“Operation New Kangleipak”, AFSPA etc] are frustrating and absurd. It is in the midst of these ambiguities, frustrations and absurdities vis-à-vis the “contestation” of power regimes that the ban on Hindi films in Manipur, and its trajectories, could be best situated. In the logic of the nation-state commercial film is seen as a powerful means of production of cultural forms and desires. This recognition motivated RPF and others to ban Hindi films, seen as a means of Indianization. However, what is interesting is that the state refuses to engage “officially” with the issue, it has seemed to compromise its powers with “tacit” understandings. This is a peculiar form of governmentality that cannot be reduced purely to legality. On the other hand, the militant nationalist groups have not been successful in stopping the people in Manipur from watching Hindi films either. The resistance of the kind “emerging” from the analysis of the “expressive resistance” is not exactly subversion of or adaptation to the power regimes. I find it useful to bring in Ramon Williams’ (1977:113) reading of “hegemonic” to give a sense of what I am hinting at here.

“One way of expressing the necessary distinction between practical and abstract senses within the concept [hegemony] is to speak of the ‘hegemonic’ rather than the ‘hegemony’, and of the ‘dominant’ rather than simple ‘domination’. The reality of any hegemony, in the extended political and cultural sense, is that, while by definition it is always dominant, it is never either total or exclusive. At any time, forms of alternative or directly oppositional politics and culture exist as significant elements in the society. We shall need to explore their conditions and their limits, but their active presence is decisive, not only because they have to be included in any historical (as distinct from epochal) analysis, but as forms which have had significant effect on the hegemonic process itself.”

It is in the spirit of this “hegemonic” that Manipur has been conceptualized as “contested” space, not contested space or contested place. Because contestation without qualifying it with “ ” betrays a sense of a priori, static worldviews, therefore totalizing. Similarly, place sounds more (relatively) pronouncedly marked than space. I also feel that “contested” space also allows possibilities of alternative politics from within, by granting intelligence to the “oppositional” movements which the term “durable disorder”(Baruah), I think, obscures.

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[1] A collective noun referring to the youth; naha = young (man or woman), lol = all; naha+lol = nahlol/naharol.

[2] In the jokes, when the Naharol encounters an “older” person, which is usually the case, the Naharol refers to the butt of the joke as “Tamo”, the honorific term for elder brother, yet that does not stop him from , say, shooting the butt at the thigh. This sarcasm associated with the Naharol in his encounter with the people is a common feature of popular lore and jokes.

[3] Long hair with men has two basic registers in contemporary Manipur, and in India generally – (a) religious, like the Sikhs or Sanamahi etc.. (b) secular; unruly, rebellious, western music = morally corrupt etc.

[4] Refers to the security sweeps the Indian Army undertakes, “combing” (like combing hair) certain areas of settlement for “insurgent” bodies.

[5] A traditional dress that men wear, something like the dhoti or the lungee.

[6] Sounds like “mera” in Hindi meaning mine/my.

[7] Sounds like the Hindi “tera” meaning your.

[8] In the foreword to Basso (1979)