Imphal, Dec. 30: About two months after floating a new party to contest the upcoming Manipur Assembly election, Manipur’s iconic activist Irom Sharmila and her team jointly launched crowd funding, an online fund raising campaign for the party on Friday.
Speaking at the launch of the campaign at Peoples Resurgence and Justice Alliance (PRJA) office here, Sharmila said their party really needs such kind of initiative as the Election Commission of India had even sanctioned a limited amount of expenditure for documentation and printing pamphlets. “We need to share our ideas to bring a change in Manipur (through pamphlets etc),” she said. “Our movement is to bring real justice and real democracy and also to change the system. But we need people’s blessing,” she said.
The co-convenor of PRJA also expressed her desire to ride across the state with her bicycle to understand the feelings and sentiments of the common people.
On October 18, Sharmila, also known as “Iron lady of Manipur’, and some like-minded youth led by Erendro Leichonbam floated PRJA to contest the Manipur Assembly election slated for early next year.
Earlier in August this year, Sharmila broke what is acknowledged as the world’s longest hunger strike – a marathon 16-year fast demanding repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) which is currently in force in the North Eastern states and Jammu and Kashmir.
Stating that the online crowd funding initiative is being taken up in association with ketto, a Mumbai based fundraiser organisation (https://www.ketto.org/fundraiser/prja)for the social cause and community empowerment, PRJA convenor Erendro said, “We are confident that it will be a big success.”
The manifesto of PRJA party, which mainly aims to end injustice and demilitarization in Manipur, will also be released soon, besides it is all set to field five candidates, including Sharmila from Thoubal constituency, in the ensuing Assembly elections in Manipur next year, he added. The other four candidates to be fielded are Erendro in Thangmeiband, Najma in Wabagai, Bowang Kho in Karong and M Illiaj Khan in Lilong.
The convenor of the party also added that the movement to repeal AFSPA will also be the priorities of the party in Manipur.
