Six Meitei relief camp inmates, including three minors, have gone missing after Monday’s gunfight in Manipur’s Jiribam district that led to the death of 10 suspected Kuki-Zo militants.

Cops on Tuesday night said Borobekra police station, where internally displaced persons (IDPs) have been given shelter, and the CRPF post located at nearby Jakuradhor were attacked by armed militants on Monday afternoon. Some houses were damaged and torched by the suspected militants during the attack,
they said.

Following the attack, the police said, 13 civilians were found missing but three of them were later rescued from Guakhal. Further search in Jakuradhor village led to the recovery of the charred bodies of two civilians. One person was rescued while another surfaced on Monday night.

“At present, six civilian IDPs, including three women and three children, are still missing. Search operations are going on to find them,” the police said, adding the situation in the state was tense but under control.

The police did not identify the communities that the six missing persons belonged to but an official said they were Meiteis and had been living in relief camps close to the Borobekra police station since June when Jiribam got engulfed in the conflict.

Congress MP A. Bimol Akoijam, a women’s collective and a Jiribam-based organisation have demanded the safe rescue of the six “abducted” persons.

In a post on X, Akoijam appealed to central and state leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and Manipur chief minister N. Biren Singh, to “ensure” their safe release or else the leaders would be “solely responsible” if anything
“untoward happens”.

Uploading a photograph of the missing women and minors, the X post said: “Look at the faces of these women and children; they are citizens of this country.”

“Do whatever you must with all the resources under your command to ensure their safety and freedom from their armed ‘Kuki’ abductors. God forbid, if anything untoward happens to these innocent women and children, you shall be solely responsible,” Akoijam’s post said.

The first-time Congress MP’s post has once again put the spotlight on the Centre and the state government for failing to check the raging ethnic violence in Manipur that has claimed at least 253 lives and left over 60,000 displaced.

The Jiri Apunba Lup (JAL), a Meitei civil society organisation, said the armed Kuki-Zo-Hmar militants “burned down 16 houses and two innocent villagers”, seriously injured another person besides “kidnapping” six members of the “same family” on Monday during their attack on the Meitei villages of Jakuradhor Karong and Harinagar under the Borobekra subdivision of Jiribam district.

The JAL said the government should take necessary action to rescue the kidnapped persons within 24 hours and arrest the abductors or else face an agitation. The JAL also expressed their “deep gratitude” to CRPF personnel for protecting their lives and properties in Jiribam.

Imagi Meira, a women’s collective in Imphal, also urged the government to rescue the “abducted” persons while lashing out at the state administration for its apparent “inability” to address the ongoing conflict.

The police termed as “baseless” the statements put out by organisations holding the CRPF and the Manipur police responsible for Monday’s incident.