Irom Sharmila's struggle continues, this time to prove herself an Indian
Sharmila has no documents to prove her citizenship - PAN card, voter identity card or a bank account.
New Delhi: Despite becoming a modern living legend across the world, Irom Sharmila is struggling to prove herself an Indian as she has no legal identification document.
The 44-year-old rights activist broke her 16-year-long peaceful hunger strike against Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act earlier this month and stated that she would contest elections to continue her fight against the controversial law.
However, Sharmila has no documents to prove her citizenship. She doesn’t have a PAN card, voter identity card or a bank account required for her to contest polls.
According to a report, her friends have begun the paper work to get her all the required documents that can prove her an Indian citizen and subsequently let her contest polls.
“Her campaign, if at all she ends up in politics, needs to be crowd-funded. And for that she needs a bank account and a PAN card while it is unimaginable for anyone without a voter ID to be a people’s representative,” one of Sharmila’s friends was quoted as saying in a report.
Days after she ended her epic fast, Manipur's 'Iron Lady' had said there is no change in her decision to take a plunge into politics, notwithstanding the opposition to it and hoped to make a "new beginning" in her campaign for the repeal of the contentious AFSPA in the state.
The activist, who suddenly found herself friendless and faces a hostile response from her supporters, also acknowledged that people were generally unhappy with her decision to break the fast and enter politics.
The decision did not go down well with the civil society groups as well as the general public who have kind of abandoned her.
From her family to close friends and even neighbours, Sharmila faced protests by locals and also reported threats by some militant groups and ironically has returned to the same hospital which had been her home for 16 years.
Assembly polls in Manipur are due in 2017.
She has been campaigning doggedly for scrapping the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act clamped in the northeastern state after 10 civilians were killed by security forces in 2000.