Degel Menashe Launches 2023-24 Scholarship Program

(September 21, 2023) Degel Menashe announced this week that, starting October 1, it will be accepting applications for its 2023-24 academic scholarship program. Made by Executive Director Yitzhak Thangjom, the announcement set a November 30 deadline for applications to be submitted. Scholarship winners will be notified by the end of December, and the scholarship money will be dispensed soon afterwards.

“This year’s program is our best endowed ever,” Thangjom told our Newsletter. “It’s our fifth season since the program’s beginning in January, 2020 and every year has seen an increase in the number of applicants, scholarships awarded, and funds allocated. Last year we had 21 award winners. We hope that the current year will see more.”

As in previous years, applicants are required to have at least one B’nei Menashe parent, to be in possession of bagrut (high school matriculation) certificates, and to be registered at a recognized academic institution in Israel. A new feature of the program this year, Thangjom told us, is that scholarship winners will be required to contribute several hours of their time in the course of the year to B’nei Menashe community service.

Thangjom also hopes there will be less of an imbalance this year between male and female award winners. “For every young man applying in the past,” he says, “there have been five or more young women. This reflects a situation in which many more B’nei Menashe girls are choosing to pursue academic studies than B’nei Menashe boys. One reason for this may be that the boys are expected by their families to go to work and contribute to their family’s income as quickly as possible, whereas girls are given more leeway.”

Beneficiaries of Degel Menashe scholarship 2022-23, hearing words of encouragement from Deputy Director, Eyal Nitzani of the Israel Students' Authority. (File photo)

Another reason, Thangjom suggests, may be a lack of confidence among B’nei Menashe boys that they can succeed in in an academic environment. “In traditional B’nei Menashe society,” he points out, “the man was the breadwinner and undisputed head of his household, yet most B’nei Menashe children in Israel today see their fathers mired in minimum-wage, low-prestige work in factories and elsewhere. Too many B’nei Menashe boys see this as their fate, too, and don’t believe in their ability to go further. Young B’nei Menashe women seem to be less affected, perhaps because they identify with their fathers less. They tend to have more ambition and more faith in themselves. We have to encourage young B’nei Menashe men to feel the same way. Right now, the high school drop-out rate among them is very high. This is an issue that needs to be addressed.”

All in all, however, Thangjom says, Degel Menashe’s scholarship program has been a resounding success. “We’ve had 59 scholarship recipients to date,” he sums up, “sixteen of whom have already received either a college degree or a a professional diploma and two of whom have successfully completed their Masters’ degrees. Our award winners are studying in a wide range of fields – social work, nursing, education, computer science, architecture, business administration, medical technology, interior decorating, and industrial design to name some. They will all go on to make a significant contribution to Israeli society and to the B’nei Menashe community, which is on the whole, unfortunately, stuck at the bottom of Israel’s social and economic ladder. It needs to start climbing it. Our program is meant to help it to do so.”

Application forms for Degel Menashe’s 2023-24 scholarship can be gotten by sending a request for them to Yitzhak Thangjom, email: degelmenashe@gmail.com, phone: 054 6707853.

ROSH HASHANA GREETINGS TO ALL OUR READERS

Construction Nears Completion at Suongpi

Jesse Gangte.

(September 14, 2023) The initial structure of a joint Degel Menashe-B’nei Menashe Council project for housing homeless B’nei Menashe displaced by the recent ethnic violence is Manipur is nearing completion, our Newsletter has learned. The building, the first of several planned for the site, stands on 250 acres of land outside the city of Lamka (formerly Churachandpur) that have been donated by BMC chairman Lalam Hangshing.

“The interior and exterior wall frames are in place, the tin roof is up. and the concrete floor has been poured,” we were told by Jesse Gangte, the BMC’s Manipur treasurer and director of the project. “All that remains to be done structurally is finishing the walls and installing doors and windows. We already have the agreement of the nearby village of Vangphai to connect us to its electric grid, which will call for 600 meters of cable on wooden poles, while water will be supplied by tanker trucks. Our plan is to acquire a large plastic storage tank with a capacity of several thousand liters and to pipe water to it from a nearby stream, but this will be costly, and for the moment, we’ll have to rely on water deliveries by tanker trucks.”

Frames for the shelter being set up.

The building will be divided into five small dwelling units, each housing one family and measuring 25 x 20 feet. (Since its total cost, it is estimated, will be about $7,000, this will come to $1.400 per unit, a small sum for resettling an entire family.) A separately standing shed that has already gone up will serve as a communal kitchen, while additional sheds will be erected for a communal bath and latrines. The complex should be ready for occupancy, Gangte told us, by Sukkot. “Two of the five families,” he says, “have already chosen adjacent plots of land and begun to farm them: one is growing beans and the other has a large vegetable garden. Once all the families have moved in, each will be given its own plot. The idea is for them to grow complementary crops that will make them relatively self-sufficient in terms of food while leaving enough over for sale at local markets in order to provide them with some cash as well.”

Shem Haokip, head mason.

The head of the construction crew at Suongpi is Shem Haokip, a builder by profession and a B’nei Menashe from the village of Sajal, which was attacked by Meitei assailants last May. “The Meiteis burned everything to the ground, including our synagogue,” he told us. “My family spent many days in an army camp, and then moved to Lamka, where we were put up by the BMC at the Eliyahu Avichail School. Suongpi is a godsend for us. We all hope that the settlement will grow. There’s plenty of land and plenty of still homeless B’nei Menashe households in need of permanent quarters.”

According to Yitzhak Thangjom, Degel Menashe’s managing director, there are some 35-40 such households in Lamka and Kangpokpi. “”We’ll try to house them at Suongpi as quickly as we can raise the money to build more units,” he says. “The idea is to create more than just a refuge. It’s to build a small, self-sustaining community that will lead a semi-collective life, democratically making its own rules and decisions. One might think of it as a little B’nei Menashe kibbutz.”

Everyone, irrespective, lends a helping hand.

Asked what the logic of such an investment was when all the B’nei Menashe of Manipur are looking forward to their Aliyah to Israel, Thangjom said: “No one knows when and how quickly the Aliyah of the remaining 5,000 B’nei Menashe in Manipur and Mizoram will take place. To judge by the pace of Aliyah in the past, it could easily be a matter of another five or ten years. Meanwhile, the displaced families need a place to live. Suongpi is not only the best and cheapest place for this, it has exciting possibilities that do not exist elsewhere. It’s not an opportunity to pass up.”

Right now, Thangjom told us, Suongpi is missing, not only the funds needed to build additional units, but missing the Hebrew name that Lalam Hangshing wants to give it in time for its occupancy late this or early next month. Our readers are invited to write in their suggestions.

A finishing touch for the flooring.