Filmed 76 days ago, a video that shows two disrobed women being paraded along a village road and scores of men harassing them physically has surfaced in Manipur on Tuesday.
The horrific scenes that purportedly unfolded on May 4 are a reminder of how little the outside world still knows about the scale of the conflict in Manipur although 77 days have passed since the clashes broke out in the northeastern state and at least 150 lives have been lost.
The video also calls into question the business-as-usual facade maintained by Prime Minister Narendra Modi who has found time for foreign tours and political trips within the country but has not yet even spoken in public on the Manipur conflict, let alone visit the state.
A source in Manipur said that the two women, one in her twenties and the other in her fifties, belonged to the Kuki community, and one of them was gang-raped in a paddy field in Thoubal police district on the foothills.
The father and the brother of the younger woman were bludgeoned to death by the attackers when they tried to resist the assault on the two women, the source said.
The source alleged that the attackers were made up of radicalised Meitei youths belonging to two armed outfits, Arambai Tenggol and Meitei Leepun.
On Wednesday, a Manipur police statement referred to the video. As regards “the viral video of two women paraded naked by unknown armed miscreants on 4th May, 2023, a case of abduction, gang rape and murder etc was registered at (police station and district) against unknown armed miscreants and the investigation has been started. The state police are making all-out efforts to arrest the culprits at the earliest,” K. Meghachandra Singh, SP, Manipur police, said in the statement.
The statement said that “during the last 24 hours, the situation in the state is peaceful but tense in some places with sporadic incidents of firing and gathering of crowd at different places”.
A senior officer with a paramilitary force, belonging to the Kuki community, told this newspaper: “Neither the state nor the central government seems to have the intent or the skills to handle the situation.... You tend to lose all hope when you see police do nothing even after an FIR is drawn up and one eyewitness gives an account of the incident.”
A source said: “The incident took place on May 4, just at the beginning of the conflict.... A close relative of the elder victim lodged a complaint on May 13 at Saikul police station in Kangpokpi district (not the place of occurrence). They could not lodge the complaint in the place of occurrence as the Meitei people had taken control of the area where the incident took place.”
Based on conversations with multiple sources belonging to the Kuki community, the following chronology of events between May 3 and May 13 has been drawn up by this newspaper. The statements are allegations.
- Armed youths belonging to Arambai Tenggol and Meitei Leepun raid at least 10 villages.
- They loot movable properties and then set the villages on fire, forcing the residents to flee.
- Five people from one village — three women and two men — flee to a jungle near another village.
- The Meitei gang scours the jungle in search of domesticated cattle and finds the five persons.
- Two of the women are disrobed — the third escapes as one of the predators was known to her — and paraded along the road.
- The video footage shows scores of men harassing them while they are being dragged away.
- The younger woman was gang-raped, according to the FIR.
- Her father and brother try their best to protect her and the other woman but the men are bludgeoned to death, according to the FIR.
- A police vehicle is a few metres away from the place of occurrence but the cops leave when the assault begins.
- The victims flee after the assault and reach a Kuki-dominated district where they receive first aid.
- One of the close relatives of the elder woman lodges an FIR on May 13. The police then speak to her and get an account of the assault.
- The trio — the two assaulted women and the one who escaped — reach a relief camp in another Kuki-dominated district.
“The officer-in-charge of the Saikul police station got his transfer order two days after he got the FIR registered.... He had begun the process of investigation and spoken to one of the two women over the phone. Before his transfer, he even transferred the FIR to the police station concerned, where the incident took place. But nothing has happened after that,” said a source close to the police.
The source spoke to this newspaper before the Manipur police issued the statement saying the police station concerned had registered the FIR.
Sources in Manipur said that after the video surfaced, the Kuki community was seething.
“The feeling among the Kuki community is that they are discriminated against.... Recently, a Naga woman was killed by the Meiteis in Imphal East district as they mistook her to be from the Kuki community. The police immediately swung into action and arrested those behind the murder, and the government gave compensation to her family and offered other assistance. But the perpetrators of the crime against the Kuki women are roaming around freely,” said a source. (Related report on Page 3)
Wait for bodies
The Kukis are also getting restless as the bodies of over 70 people killed in the first five days of the violence have still not been handed over from Imphal mortuaries to the relatives for the last rites.
“The Supreme Court asked the state government in its July 11 order to hand over the bodies, but still they are not acting,” said a source.