On Year of the Construction Workers

IT is indeed an admirable initiative on the part of the State Govt. to declare the year 2016 as the ‘Year of the Construction Workers’ to employ and impart training to our Naga youths to boost the state economy. Construction work which is said to take 15% of our state’s economy is a huge margin in a small state like ours with not many other industries to rely on. Some very urgent emerging concerns and confronting realities beseeching our society needs to be addressed at the earliest otherwise the long pretentious sleep of our Nagas has made us like the legendary Rip Van Winkle. In the tale Rip Van Winkle met some strange looking men, drank some wine from their keg and went to sleep a little too much that when he woke up he couldn’t remember who he was, where he was, what he was doing and couldn’t even recognize his own children. Quite familiar to us, isn’t it?  Though Rip really went into a deep slumber, ours is just a pretentious one. Unless the change starts from within us it is next to impossible to change the world around us. So first of all, why not set our house in order and let us be the change ourselves we wish to see. Our present legislators, bureaucrats and technocrats or whoever concerned must bring this change and really implement this ‘Year of the Construction Workers’ in true spirit and not just in letter. Our leaders must be the first to break this new ground and prove that this is just not another ‘Yearly Declaration’ or a mere rhetoric with some attractive catchphrase. If not, then mere declarations and announcing of lofty ideals and dreams will just be another one of

those too many of our past Naga proclamations and ambitions collapsing into mere paper records which vanishes into oblivion. Why not start using our local laborers in all the government constructions and construction of your own private buildings too?  We see many of our ministers, MLAs, bureaucrats and technocrats who use only non-local laborers for their work and avoid our own Naga brethrens like the plague and some lepers in their own work and so do all of us including myself. So when the Year of Construction Workers has been declared, hope we transform this vision into reality. Our Naga people may be asking about higher wages than others but Rome wasn’t built in a day. Let’s us just encourage them. Because it’s not only about those wages but our people taking up these works is really precious. These tiny drops of water make an ocean. Initially you cannot change anything in a jiffy or overnight, so start absorbing them in all the works and fix a common rate for different types of works like of masonry, plumbing, electrification, painting, tiles works etc. Heard the Labour Deptt makes rate for these things but everything is self styled and khushi-khushi in this khushi-khushi land and so everyone and anyone make their own rate. It’s quite a time since the wage rates of different types of profession are published in this land whereas in different place a periodic rate of all types of skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled are published so as an uniform rate is followed. They may be bit higher but we have to mould them and nurture them because our Naga people doing these things are a rare sight and they are precious. I don’t want to say that outsiders should not be employed at all because it would be very much wrong in the eyes of God and in the spirit of humanity too. Most of the construction till date in our land, like our own houses,offices,schools,roads,bridges, hospitals and churches etc. has all been done by the non-local labors and we should be grateful to them. They too are human beings and they have their own stomachs and families to feed of course. These people aren’t faceless, unfeeling dummies of a hoary, sometimes regressive way of life. They too are flesh and blood individuals with dreams, fears and regrets and in many cases with no other way of earning a livelihood. But not at the cost of our generations being submerged by outside influx. For too long our Naga’s false pride of the crippling thought that manual workers and construction work should be done only by others is one of the most myopic and a suicidal one. This is going to cost us dearly, very dearly. The crime rates among the disgruntled and frustrated youths seem to be only increasing due to voluntary unemployment where lots of employment avenues are available but not willing to work. But thanks to the new breed of our upcoming young Nagas who are willing to do any kind of work as long as they can earn their livelihood in a dignified way. Today these immigrants maybe doing only our manual works but slowly and surely a sharp shift is sure inevitable to economic control and finally their political dominance too is undeniable in a the very near future because population matters and population controls the system anywhere or everywhere. Our preference for the non-local laborers is aplenty. From cheap bargain-able rates to sincere workmanship, we our present generation seems to be so much engrossed in negativities in ourselves and all around us that we fail to see the silver lining on our dark clouds. Let us not take everything as a curse but rather as an opportunity to convert them into blessings. Diamonds are just a lump of coal before they are thoroughly polished, aren’t they? Though our Naga craftsmanship and workmanship is second to none, we have to compromise ourselves and negotiate on the demand of high-rate. Only then our own people will employ us willingly and happily in their works. No matter how willing we maybe to do any work, if we don’t lower our high wages, or two meals a day, should give a packet of cigarette or a tamul no one is going to employ us. But I found these things most as exaggerated ones because most Nagas whom I’ve came across do not demand two meals a day or cigarettes and tamul. Maybe it depended upon the workers or maybe some were very demanding. Whatever, the high demanding ones will wither out in the long run which in most cases of any field do .We talk of illegal immigrants stealing away our jobs, our spaces, our opportunities etc. etc. but condemning and preaching on Facebook and social media alone is not enough. It’s not going to bring much answer and solution to the problems besieging us. Though we maybe able to highlight some issues from time to time, we need to go an extra mile in letting our deeds to materialize. Majority of our youths stay awake till the wee hours on social-networking sites writing gigantic utopian thoughts and lines about changing our Naga society and sleeping till high noon, now will that solve your illegal immigrant issue, unemployment or bring the much oft saying dignity of labor into a reality? Or do your mere writing of supreme wonderful idyllic insights with those gadgets on your palms solve that so called dignity of labor? You say our land is being over-flooded by IBI population but you don’t get married till your latest thirties or past forties and don’t possess the guts to shoulder a fatherly and motherly responsibility then how can our population remain stable? Of course,many may find this far-fetched,but let’s think out of the box. It would be better not to speak about changing our society when we don’t change ourselves. No human race or civilization will endure without stable population, economic prosperity and political will. All these need work and the determination to work. To live is to earn. Just some days back, I happened to notice a group of young Naga boys in the Lengrijan Colony, Dimapur who were constructing a retaining wall after a road widening in a particular slope as that place took some sharp narrow bend and was quite a perilous accident prone area. The colony council’s wise initiative of widening that stretch was truly an action to be emulated by all other land owners too. This band of Naga brothers were so much energetic and enthusiastic in the work they were doing. What amazed me most was that the Naga contractor who had employed them insisted that he use only Nagas for his work. What a wonderful beginning for the young people too. The recent initiatives by the Zynorique Constructions in Kohima imparting training in masonry works for unemployed youths in a phase-wise manner is one truly inspiring act. In a land where most of our youths dreams only for white-collared jobs, this twist has certainly added an edge to the Naga labor force. The true dignity of labor starts at home only. It will start only when we teach our children to make their own beds, wash their own plates, cups and bowls, wash their own clothes, sweep their own rooms, iron their own clothes, polish their own shoes and clean their own toilets. Don’t expect dignity of labor in our land or preach on the streets about it if your matured sons or daughters cannot wash even their own undergarments. It has to start from the inside of our home. Together with the masonry works, plumber, electrician, tiles, glass and painting works training should also be imparted if the government really wishes to see the construction segment by our local bloom in full glory. Only then the glory deserves the trumpeting call. Unemployment is just a state of mind. Every work is worship in itself if we love our work and are dedicated to it. When we earn our bread through the sweat of our own brow, then we should not be ashamed of anything. Let’s stop grumbling and stop pointing fingers on one another. Unless we take charge of ourselves, our economy will neither grow nor will our survival endure. No matter how much money is pumped into our state it will never circulate but it will rather flow outside. My friends, from outside who have been long here in Nagaland oft says that we always want to take the cake and eat it too but not the blame.  Not only unemployment problem will increase but more other social problems will multiply in geometric proportions adding to our woes only.  From our village councils and colony levels to tribal unions and district authorities, if we start the dignity  of labor from our own homes and surroundings I am sure the government’s initiative will not be a failure. Then only Nagaland will grow like Meghalaya or Mizoram. Otherwise our usual blame game on any issue has grown like a cancerous cell in our society while the land and the present generation hangs on like a scar tissue on a body about to fall. Let us all hope the government’s sincere initiative will provide our unemployed youths the opportunity to bring back the determination for our much harped dignity of labor. This initiative if implemented from grassroots level will surely weed out and bring down anti -social acts also that has deteriorated and disintegrated our society. Nagas should also learn to bloom where they are planted. Not everyone is assigned with the same tasks and neither with same creativity and talent. The world needs all kind of works and no work is small or humiliating. Time we shed off the IAS, Doctor, Engineer Syndrome. Make it an opportunity not only for the educated unemployed youths but also for school and college drop outs. In a competitive world of cutthroat competition of modernization and materialistic environment, if we don’t work to eat we are in a danger of being swallowed by the vortex of time. Steve Jobs,the late innovator guru said ‘Stay hungry, stay foolish’. But its’ not too late.