Imphal, Feb. 28: The president of the Manipur-based organisation that is campaigning against the use of the Bengali script in school textbooks has been detained under the National Security Act (NSA).

The court of the chief judicial magistrate, Imphal, today remanded Chingsubam Akaba, alias Guneswar, in judicial custody till March 14.

The 60-year-old chief of the Meitei Erol Eyek Loinasillon Apunba Lup was arrested on February 24 on charges of inciting members of his organisation to burn lakhs of textbooks in the Bengali script.

Akaba had also threatened publication houses and the Board of Secondary Education, Manipur, against publishing Meitei books in the Bengali script. He said the Okram Ibobi Singh government?s indifference towards the demand for the replacement of the Bengali script with the Meitei one had provoked the activists into setting fire to piles of books forcibly collected from schools and shops.

In his order for Akaba?s detention under the NSA, Imphal East district magistrate K.K. Chhetry said his activities were ?prejudicial to maintenance of public order under Section 3 (2) of the NSA?.

The detention, however, is to be confirmed later by a board constituted by the state government.

The court of the chief judicial magistrate had agreed to grant bail to Akaba if he furnished a bond of Rs 10,000 and a surety of the same amount. But the money was not deposited, ostensibly because he was likely to be detained again under the NSA.

The court construed a statement made by Akaba and published in a daily before his arrest as inflammatory. The president of the Meitei Erol Eyek Loinasillon Apunba Lup had called for complete abolition of the Bengali script from Manipur. Over 150 script activists have been rounded up since the agitation started on February 10.

Language dailies have been resisting demands by the activists to use the Meitei script instead of the Bengali one on their front pages from March 1. Manipuri dailies use the Bengali script, as do all educational institutions in the state.

?It is simply not practical. The majority of the readers do not understand the script. Who will read the front page and what is the point of publishing news if only a small section of the people are going to read it? Moreover, there are technical difficulties. For instance, a new software is required,? the editor of a language daily said.

TB conclave

A staff reporter

Guwahati, Feb. 28: The department of TB and Respiratory Medicine of Gauhati Medical College is organising a daylong programme, Respiratory update 2005, on March 6.

Several eminent physicians from all over the country will participate and shed light on the advancement made in the diagnosis and treatment of TB and other respiratory diseases.