Sophy Lasuh
My first direct interaction with the Nagaland government was during the summer of 2004. My media partner & I applied for the CM’S Corpus Fund. Our project was short listed for the interview and categorized under the IT sector. Yet we got our approval signature from the IPR!!! However, such details were overlooked. It wasn’t an ambitious project. We applied only for a basic editing machine. Both of us armed with media degrees and work experience were confident of getting it. But we did not. The heart to criticize my government started there. But my own silenced me. My own being the boys, girls, ladies and gentlemen who made it to the interview. Our brief interaction outside the DC office, Kohima impressed upon me that while some were genuine, some were okay. While some were phony, some were out rightly outrageous. But, some left me speechless.
Suspicious as my memory is, I recall a clause under “Terms & Conditions”, which states that a Corpus Fund applicant cannot be on the government payroll. The ones that left me speechless were these government servants posing as unemployed applicants. Those that outraged me were the wives facing the interview for their husbands. The phony ones were those who didn’t have a clue because they were given ready made projects. At least that’s what they claimed.
All these made me stop writing against the Corpus Fund selection procedures. I really couldn’t tell who was taking whom for a ride. The Selection Committee were up against big-time phonies and my own were going to beat them hands down. In spite of how much people crib, rant and rave about “this” and “that” candidate applicant receiving the fund, I worry about my own who try to compete with them. Playing with a “back-up” and playing as if it’s a one man’s game are two different ball games altogether. Frankly speaking, I don’t know which one is worse.
I trace my old untitled document and remember a lady who made me speechless. She had a similar effect on me when we chanced upon her near our workstation. She was of the impression that we got it. We tell her we made it on our own. She tells us, she made it through the fund.
Three summers have gone by and the Corpus Fund has long been forgotten as a failed project. It is remembered as a launch pad which pushed us to go places we normally would have avoided. It made us discover that our potential and talents are bigger than all the funds put together.
Today, I read the news piece inviting applications for the Corpus Fund and I wonder if the players play the same game or has the bar been raised? I wonder how many dreams will come to an end and how many will come to pass. I remember how it felt to be an applicant. How we clutched on to our files. How we braved the heat, rain and hunger. How we all wore our best clothes as if it mattered and all that jazz.
