Tuesday, 19 November 2024
Tuesday, 19 November 2024
Hundreds of people walked in a march with empty coffins in Manipur's Churachandpur district on Tuesday, demanding justice for those killed in a gunfight with the security forces in Jiribam.
Ten suspected militants were killed in the gunfight with security forces last week after insurgents in camouflage uniforms, armed with sophisticated weapons, fired indiscriminately at the Borobekra police station and an adjacent CRPF camp at Jakuradhor in Jiribam, according to the Manipur Police.
The rally, organised by the Joint Philanthropic Organisation (JPO), started around 11 am. Hundreds of people participated in it with placards demanding justice for those killed, and a separate administration in the hill areas.
The march concluded at the 'Wall of Remembrance', a memorial for the Kuki people killed in the ethnic violence in the state since May last year.
Later, a memorandum addressed to Union Home Minister Amit Shah was submitted to the district administration.
The Kuki-Zo groups have been claiming that those killed in Jiribam were village volunteers. However, the state police pointed to a huge number of arms and ammunition that were found at the spot after the gunfight was over to counter the claim.
More than 220 people have been killed and thousands rendered homeless in ethnic violence between Imphal Valley-based Meiteis and adjoining hills-based Kuki-Zo groups since May last year.
The ethnically diverse Jiribam, which was largely untouched by the clashes, began to witness violence after the mutilated body of a farmer was found in a field in June this year.
The Union Home Ministry deployed 50 companies of the Central Armed Police Force to violence-hit Manipur to handle the present "volatile" situation in Jiribam district .
A meeting was chaired by Home Minister Amit Shah, who sought extra information. Shah held a meeting on Sunday too.
Subsequent to the meeting a ministry team will visit violence-affected areas shortly to help state officials in managing the situation, sources said. There is also a discussion on further re-imposing the contentious AFSPA, or Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, in 'hyper-sensitive' areas, sources added.
As protestors took to the streets, setting vehicles ablaze and attacking the residences of several MLAs in the State’s capital Imphal, the government temporarily suspended internet and mobile data services in seven affected districts of the valley, which is dominated by the non-tribal Meiteis, and the surrounding hills where the tribal Kuki-Zos are in a majority. Curfew was also clamped in the three valley districts of Imphal East, Imphal West, and Bishnupur.
Rajkumar Imo Singh, the son-in-law of Chief Minister Nongthombam Biren Singh, was among the MLAs whose houses were targeted. The CM’s personal residence on the outskirts of Imphal was also reportedly attacked by a mob Saturday night. Before the two-day curfew was imposed from 4:30 p.m., large groups of people went about asking the MLAs to quit if the government was unable to ensure peace and punish the “killers of women and children”.
Bodies identified
Officials in southern Assam’s Cachar district, which borders the violence-scarred Jiribam district of Manipur, said that three bodies were taken to the morgue of the Silchar Medical College and Hospital (SMCH) on Saturday afternoon. These bodies were recovered from the upstream parts of the Barak River along the Assam-Manipur border, close to where three more bodies had been recovered on Friday night.
The State government, in a statement, confirmed that three of these bodies were of people who had gone missing from a relief camp in Jiribam’s Borobekra area since Monday’s gunfight, in which the Central Reserve Police Forces (CRPF) and Manipur police personnel gunned down 10 “militants”. Kuki-Zo organisations claimed that the slain men were “village volunteers”.
Rising tension
The Manipur government declared a holiday for schools and colleges after tension started building up in the valley on Friday night after the recovery of the three bodies. Protestors, led by women in many places, blocked roads and burnt tyres across the valley on Saturday morning, triggering panic-buying of essentials before shops and business establishments downed shutters.
Plea against AFSPA
The Manipur government on Saturday wrote to the Union Home Secretary seeking a review and withdrawal of the “disturbed area” notification for six police stations under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act.
AFSPA was re-imposed in six police station areas, including Jiribam, on Thursday.
AFSPA gives sweeping powers to the military to operate anywhere that is declared a 'disturbed area'; no military personnel in an AFSPA area can be prosecuted without the central government's nod.
On the political front, the National People's Party withdrew support to the BJP, claiming that Chief Minister N Biren Singh's government had "completely failed to resolve the crisis".
The NPP, though, has said it has not withdrawn support from the government, and is acting specifically against the Biren Singh-led administration only. "We have suggested that trust needs to be built... it is because of trust deficit that efforts to bring peace are not succeeding. (But) no trust-building efforts were undertaken," NPP boss and Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sagma declared.
The NPP has 7 MLAs in the 60-member Assembly. The BJP has 32, one over majority.
The ruling party has also come under pressure from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the BJP's ideological mentor, which has demanded a swift resolution of the persistent crisis.
