Churachandpur witnesses fresh round of violence after remaining under peaceful for 18hrs. At Changpikot, Inter community clashes between Kukis and Meitis occured on night 05/ 06 May. 3 persons of one community, apparently, were killed.
In another incident, Violent crowd of approximately 400 people surrounded Army and Assam Rifles columns in Lamka Village, Churachandpur District. Owing to violent and life threatening actions of the crowd, fire was opened as a last resort by Security Forces. Eye witnesses say two people were injured and were immediately evacuated by the violent crowd themselves.
Root Cause of the Problem:
Kuki and Meiti divide. Violence is just the symptom.
The protests took a violent form with the formation of various militant and insurgent groups.
Even in this regard of political independence, Manipur is not united. Thee are majorly 2 tribes (Meitei and Kuki) in Manipur, both with a separate set of demands.
The Meitei insurgent groups seek independence from India.
The Kuki insurgent groups want a separate state for the Kukis to be carved out from the present state of Manipur.
The issue is further complicated as Manipur is not unified by a language. There are as many as 29 different dialects with 5 main tribal dialects recognized by Government of Manipur for medium of instruction and examination up to class V.
There is also a divide among the people based on where they live- the valley or the hill. Meitei tribes lives mostly in valleys whereas Kuki on hills.Kukis can buy land in valley, but meitis can’t buy land in hills.
Lack of overall development:
Lack of development in Manipur is also a reason for the rumbling suspicion between the hill and valley areas.Over the last few years, most development work has taken place only in the valley areas, thus leaving the hill tribes with a lot of resentment towards the majority community, as if a planned ‘conspiracy’ has been afoot to keep their areas backward.
Both the Union and the state governments must rectify this at once to help develop better relations between the hill and valley. This is essential for peaceful co-existence.
On ground, CAPFs etc need to be brought in immediately, as we need to restore economy, open markets otherwise this inter community clashes will grow into a bigger humanitarian crisis.
While security forces are doing everything they can in the kinetic operations domain, state government and political hierarchy needs to step up political outreach towards communities virtually at war each other.
(With inputs from Pratyusha Mukherjee)
(Author is a Sr.journalist working for a western media with 20 years of experience in covering the east and northeast, with specialisation in Defence and Sports.In her illustrated career she has covered many major events and achieved International and National media awards for Journalism).
