By Patricia Mukhim
As a society we choose symbols we venerate and they have not changed in a long, long time. The same heroes are venerated because we have not produced any in recent times. Forget about heroines. These are out of our mindscapes. We are not used to honouring women! Period. Actually, tradition should be a sort of moral framework that has stood the test of time and one we should rest our moral compasses on. Our tradition never mentioned extortion as a livelihood. But we have defied that part of tradition to embrace a culture where we don’t want to work but want all the pleasures of life. In our tradition the men had well brewed rice beer. Now that is forgotten and people readily embrace Indian Made Foreign Liqour (IMFL). But the same set of men who enjoy IMFL and other cocktails in the evening at some bar or some affluent friend’s place will argue until they are blue in the face why tradition is sacred.
An important argument is that tradition is linked to identity. So those guys who extort money are no longer part of this society right? Then which society are they part of? Are they outcastes? What about those that steal from the public purse or people’s collective moneybag? Are they still Khasi, Jaintia, Garo tribals? Show us one moral-ethical teaching in any of the three languages where stealing is condoned. There isn’t any. Tradition tells us that those who stole were given a public upbraiding and due punishment. Is there anyone in this society today including the sacrosanct traditional institutions that can call out the thieves that regularly steal from the public purse, not in lakhs but in hundreds of crores of rupees? No. On the contrary we give them a place of pride at every function and push our way through the crowd to be able to shake hands with them. It gives us a mental kick. Like having a super strong beverage!
The spiritual part of tradition is a roadmap that tells us what’s right and what’s wrong and how we ought to avoid the pitfalls of wrongdoing because we believe that every wrong we do invites divine retribution. This is the reason why those embracing the indigenous faith regularly appease their ancestors and the creator (U Blei Nongbuh Nongthaw). Humans, no matter what religion they claim to belong to, actually pray when they seek for something beyond themselves. The material part of tradition is a trajectory that we have been following because our ancestors did certain things in a certain way. Our ancestors have, through a process of selection and rejection, come up with a certain framework. As a living society we have to hold ourselves to some standards in a world that is fast changing. Can we adopt the rules of governance in the pre-written script era and hold fast to it just because we fear to step out and experiment with new ways of doing things?
It is interesting how we selectively use tradition to resist any reforms in governance at the very grassroots where it is most needed. Take our Dorbar Shnong which are classic examples of institutions that have refused to change because of the fear of losing power and dominance in case elections are held, as they should be for every constitutional body, unless the Dorbar Shnong feel they are not part of the Constitution. There is a weird sense of reasoning that since the Dorbar Shnong are guided by the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution, they are outside the purview of the main constitutional doctrine. This implies that the Sixth Schedule is a stand-alone document. But it is not! The Sixth Schedule cannot override the Indian Constitution.
The District Councils created under the Sixth Schedule actually believe they have control and command over the traditional institutions, especially the Syiemships, Raids and Shnongs. Whether these three organs of traditional institutions feel a sense of belonging towards the Councils is a different matter. In the present scenario we find the Dorbar Shnong of different localities coming up with different writs to suit their own purposes. One of these is to collect parking fees from vehicles that are parked by the roadside even when such roadside parking is what causes traffic jams or slows down traffic. The questions here are: Who has granted permission to the Dorbar Shnong to collect parking fees from cars parked on roads that belong to the public and have been constructed from public funds? Can any of the Dorbar Shnong enlighten us as to which authority has given them permission to allow vehicles to park on the main road on payment of a certain fee? Since the Dorbar Shnong do not come under the purview of the Right to Information, they can take this question as one that carries the public mandate.
This is not to say that all Dorbar Shnong operate on a “laissez faire” model. Many of them try their best to serve the interests of the public residing within their jurisdiction. But they suffer from funds constraints and are therefore heavily dependent on the MLAs/MDCs for development work even for the smallest repairs related to water pipes, footpaths and roads. Much has been written about the need to fund these institutions along the lines of the 73rd Amendment – (the Panchayati Raj System) so that they too can avail direct funding from the central government. For how long can the office bearers of the Dorbar Shnong work pro-bono? Is it fair to expect them to sort all intricate para-legal issues within the shnong without being paid for their services? Isn’t the need for funds the reason why some dorbars are collecting parking fees or some other forms of collection?
Let’s come to the crux of the matter now which is garbage. Recently we were privy to the news that Marten is about to go kaput if it has not already done so. Can all of us living within Greater Shillong and hugely dependent on that garbage dump sit with folded hands and pretend that it’s not our problem? Should garbage be the problem of only the Government? What is the civic responsibility of every citizen? As a collective, citizens tend to unite under the Dorbar Shnong. Is it not time for every Shnong to brainstorm on how to deal with garbage generated within that Shnong? How long can we sleepwalk and like hermits who have retired from active life, go on a long meditation and pretend that the garbage from our homes do not impinge on our natural environment? We no longer have that luxury! Remember that as per our tradition we never had plastics, aluminium foils, batteries that leach out poisonous lead, computer hardware parts and toxic hospital wastes that are carelessly discarded. Life was simple and much of the waste was organic and it was dumped in our backyards and became the manure we used in our kitchen gardens.
Tradition was that we constructed houses at least six feet away from our neighbour’s boundary. Today we encroach on our neighbours’ space and on public roads. Where did that tradition come from? When did it start? Who started it? And if we are so gung-ho about tradition, why did we follow these ugly traits started by one or two people so much so it has now become a way of life and therefore an ugly tradition!
So next time we build our arguments on tradition remember we are going down a slippery slope. Tradition is built on the practices of some humans that are emulated by others until they become a standard practice. There is nothing sacrosanct about tradition. And tradition is certainly not linked to identity. Tradition is good only as long as it serves a public cause. And tradition is not written in stone that it cannot change. The only thing constant is change!