Wangkheimayum Ole had drug addicts in mind when his parents and relatives provided the fund to set up a rehabilitation centre in 2018. In less than four years, the centre has graduated to treating alcoholics and mobile phone addicts.
An ex-addict who had escaped from Manipur’s drug deaddiction centres 42 times before changing for the better, Mr. Ole claims to be one of the most qualified persons in the State to run a rehab. But he did not know what to do when a man deposited his teenage son – a Class 10 student – at the Realize Rehabilitation Centre (RRC) about eight months ago.
RRC is at Mongjam Chingjin, a village about 13 km north from the State capital Imphal.
“The father would not take no for an answer when we told him we handle drug addicts and some alcoholics. We took the boy in and treated him like other drug addicts in our centre,” he told The Hindu. A mix of tried-and-tested therapy and digital learning helped RRC “cure” the boy of his addiction – called nomophobia or the fear of living without a mobile phone – in about two months.
Pumpkins, gourds as fee
The RRC has been following up with the boy’s parents to ensure its efforts have not gone in vain.
The centre currently has 45 addicts undergoing various stages of rehabilitation. They include a 70-year-old former hardcore member of the extremist People’s Liberation Army, who became an alcoholic after leaving the outfit.
“He was admitted after we helped his painter-son overcome his drug addiction. The son’s services as cook and clerk at this centre takes care of the cost of the father’s rehabilitation,” Yambem Laba, a former member of the Manipur Human Rights Commission and chairman of RRC’s management committee, said.
The centre survives on small donations, often in the form of a bag of rice or potato or vegetables. A woman desperate to get her heroin-addict son treated had offered to sell one of her kidneys, but the RRC took the boy in for a few pumpkins and gourds as fee.
The centre also received 30 pairs of Ho Chi Minh sandals – inexpensive footwear used from discarded tyres – as fee from a cobbler for treating and counselling his son.
“When I took to drugs as a class 7 student in 2008, a gram of heroin smuggled in via next-door Myanmar would cost ₹3,500. But it is as cheap as ₹300 today because there are many factories in Manipur processing heroin from locally grown poppy,” Mr. Ole said.
This, Mr. Laba said, is a dangerous trend because farmers, daily wagers and others from the low-income group are getting addicted unlike in the past when getting a “fix” was seen as a rich people’s problem.
The RRC and other centres have been catering to an increasing number of such addicts whose kin can hardly pay for the rehabilitation. “We are struggling to stay afloat but are determined not to give up,” Mr. Ole said.
