Peace is the utmost desire of mankind

Peace is the utmost desire of mankind but it is disturbed by a few who deal in the production and sale of armamentarium of different kinds. This was said by Dr.M.Nara Singh – Former Minister of Health, Art and Culture Manipur who was in town and addressed a meeting of the citizens today as Chief Gust at the interactive session organised by the Indian Doctors for Peace and Development (IDPD). Giving an overview of the situation in North East India which is much disturbed these days, he cautioned that effective measures to integrate the region with the mainstream country are needed to prevent violence from further escalating. There has been long term neglect of the regions development which is rich in natural resources. This coupled with corruption to the core has led to insurgency in different parts of North East India. Due to wrong policies of the central government to appease the Naga Insurgents there has been created havoc in the states of Assam, Arunanchal Pradesh and Manipur in particular. There is blockade of National Highway 39 and 53 by the separatist National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) and the United Naga Council for nearly four months now has led extreme shortage of essential commodities in Manipur where Kersene is selling at Rs.65.00 per liter, Petrol Rs.150.00 per liter and the LPG Cylinder has been selling at Rs.1800.00. Due to non availability of Oxygen the operations are not been conducted and patients are suffering a lot. As a result of the high cost the private hospitals are charging exorbitantly. Similar is the situation with education. The public distribution system is virtually nonexistent due to which poor people are starving. The situation is very volatile. There is day in and day out extortion and killing of innocent people. This needs immediate attention said Dr.Nara Singh otherwise the North East will have extreme violence. The IDPD is doing its best to educate the people for non violence.



Addressing the gathering Dr.L.S.Chawla –President IDPD said that the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) and the IDPD are committed for a non violent world. Affirming its commitment to peace and non violence, the 19th World Congress of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) held at Basel, Switzerland decided to further enhance the work to achieve nuclear abolition by the year 2020. He had led a 51 member delegation, biggest in the world, at the congress. The physicians attending the congress expressed serious concern at the ongoing regional conflicts in different parts of the world particularly the West Asia and South Asia thus having detrimental impact on the health and education of the people in addition to adverse impact on development. But the congress hoped that the peoples movements will change the scenario as it has happened in the past when as a result of work of the peace activists the number of nuclear weapons has come down from 80,000 during the cold war period to 23,000 at present. Dr Arun Mitra – General Secretary said that the congress also demanded check on the proliferation of small arms. Whereas the buyers would be persuaded to decreased their expenditure on arms race through resolution of issues with mutual dialogue, a movement will be launched against the producers and sellers. The growing in equalities after the so called globalization has added to the miseries in the developing world and affected the climate change. This needs to be countered as the struggle for peace is in separable from the struggle for justice and equality.



Dr Bharti Uppal – Finance Secretary IDPD welcomed Dr Nara Singh and introduced the subject. Dr N S Bawa said that peace has to be won by hard work and then preserved with lot of efforts. Dr.Bablir Shah thanked the participants and asked to strengthen the peace movement. Other prominent doctors and citizens who participated include Dr Jagmohan Singh, Dr R K Sharma, Dr Anakhveer Singh Gill, Dr Narjit Kaur, Dr Suresh Jhaver, D P Maur, Mrs Kusum Lata, Mrs Gurcharan Kochcher, Mrs Jit Kumari, Mrs Avtar Kaur, Mrs Barjinder Kaur.



The meeting passed as resolution asking the central government to effectively intervene to ensure peace and development in North East India and put in sincere efforts to integrate it with the national main stream.
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