Wednesday, July 02, 2008

ATSUM stir to resume from July 10

By : A Staff Reporter

Imphal, Jul 1: The All Tribal Students' Union Manipur (ATSUM) has on Tuesday announced to resume its agitation from 6 am of July 10 and announced to boycott the state education minister L Jayentakumar, public health engineering minister TN Haokip, tribal development minister DD Thaisii, directorate of education (hills), directorate of tribal development apart from all government establishments in the hill districts including the ZEO offices with exception of schools and colleges.
Besides resuming economic blockade on the two national highways, the ATSUM is also announcing the boycott of three ministers who are all part of the talks, discussions and reaching agreement with ATSUM, and two directorates of the state as a mark of ‘deep frustration and anger to the government of Manipur’ for not abiding by its promise of fulfilling the demands of ATSUM, a statement issued by ATSUM said on Tuesday.

It is worthwhile to mention that the announcement of imposing economic blockade comes few days after the state government hired four judges to file civil suits and recover the lost amount incurred due to frequent bandhs, strikes and blockades from the sponsors of such type of agitations.

The ATSUM press release signed by its information and publicity secretary Joseph R Hmar said that the two main points on which the state government agreed to fulfill ATSUM’s demands were the Cabinet decision acknowledging the imbroglio over SC/ST reservation in Manipur University and initiation for a ‘separate university’ for the tribal people of Manipur and extension of service of contract basis teachers in hill districts.

It appealed to the general public, NGOs and individuals to cooperate and understand the plights and problems of the tribals while also acknowledging the hardships and inconveniences the common people faced during the blockade period.

Further, the statement said that as for the legal action proposed to be initiated against ATSUM by the state government “we are ready to face it-come what may! We are even ready to go on the offensive by filing a lawsuit against the government for not fulfilling its constitutional obligation of giving free education to the tribal peoples of Manipur.”

Meanwhile, the ATSUM also expressed that it supports all organizations, especially students’ bodies working for positive change in education scenario of Manipur. It said that in this regard, ATSUM welcomes the Democratic Students’ Alliance of Manipur, DESAM, initiative in declaring and making education a free zone while saying that it will collaborate with DESAM in overcoming the challenges of education in conflict area.

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