For over 44 weeks, nearly 2,000 Manipur police recruits had trained and eaten together and shared the same barracks at the Lachit Borphukan Police Academy in Dergaon, Assam.
At their passing-out parade on Monday, several Meitei and Kuki recruits told The Telegraph they were unlikely to be posted together in their home state, riven by conflict between their two communities.
However, Manipur chief minister N. Biren Singh, who attended the event in Dergaon, told reporters: “We will keep them together. Alag alag nahi rakhenge... team nahi todenge (We won’t separate them… we won’t split the team).”
A Kuki-Zo recruit from Kangpokpi and a Meitei recruit from Imphal East, standing side by side, had the same answer when asked whether they expected to be working together after returning to Manipur.
Both shook their heads, apprehensive they would be “separated” because of the situation. They agreed that they would, as “disciplined” policemen, “have to follow” whatever their higher-ups decide.
“We have lived like brothers here at the academy but the situation back home is different. We feel we won’t be working together; we will be separated,” the Kuki recruit said. His Meitei batch-mate agreed.
A police statement gave the community-wise distribution among the 1,946 recruits: 62 per cent Meiteis, 12 per cent Kukis, and the remaining 26 per cent from Naga or other tribes.
Drawn from the India Reserve Battalions and Manipur Rifles, they had been together since January, eight months after the conflict began on May 3 last year.
They will return to a Manipur where Meiteis and Kuki-Zos are staying away from each other’s areas because of security concerns. The conflict, now in its 20th month, has claimed at least 261 lives and displaced over 60,000 people.
Chief minister Singh, who thanked the Assam government and the Centre for helping train the recruits, said: “Community-community divide is because of the prevailing situation. It was not there before, and I will not allow it to happen now.”
He added: “Those who have stayed here, trained here (at the academy) will have to do the same when they return. To bring peace, we have to make a start. We will keep (post) them together…. We will try to keep the unity intact as before.”
The chief minister said it would take some time for the situation to become normal.
A police statement said the training of the recruits at the academy had factored in the law-and-order challenges in Manipur and the likelihood of the new constables’ post-training deployment in high-risk environments.
Their training, therefore, placed additional emphasis “on endurance training, including long-distance speed marches, firing proficiency, tactical training, and intensive unarmed combat (UAC) training”.
“To foster mental robustness and unit cohesion, special focus was given to national integration training, building esprit de corps, and enhancing cohesiveness among the riflemen,” the statement said.
