48-hour shutdown in two Manipur districts disrupts life amid fresh violence

A shutdown called by various Kuki-Zo groups badly affected normal life in tribal-dominated Churachandpur and Kangpokpi districts in Manipur on Sep 28, with markets and other commercial establishments remaining shut and no vehicular movement witnessed on the roads.

Meanwhile, fresh violence was reported from a village in Jiribam district on Sep 28 morning, police said in a statement, adding, that additional security forces were deployed in the area to control the situation.

The 48-hour shutdown which will end Sep 29 is called by Kuki-Zo groups, including the Committee on Tribal Unity (COTU), Indigenous Tribal Leaders Forum (ITLF), and Kuki Students Organization (KSO), in protest against alleged fake input shared by the chief minister N Biren Singh’s secretary about “infiltration of 900 militants” from Myanmar to carry out attacks on Meiteis on Sep 28.

The shutdown which began in the two districts — Churachandpur and Kangpokpi — at 6 am on Sep 27 paralyzed normal life.
A large number of bandh supporters, mostly women, were seen blocking the Imphal-Dimapur National Highway near the Kangpokpi district headquarters and Gamgiphai.

No untoward incidents have so far been reported, police said.

On Sep 26, a mass rally organized by COTU in Kangpokpi presented a memorandum to Union Home Minister Amit Shah through the district’s deputy commissioner.

The memorandum emphasized that the recent statement by the state government’s security adviser Kuldiep Singh, regarding the infiltration of militants from Myanmar, was viewed by the Kuki-Zo community as an attempt to propagate the ethnocentric narrative led by the chief minister.

Notably, the state government backtracked from the statement about the infiltration of militants earlier this week asserting that the likelihood of “any such misadventures by armed groups is minimal and unsubstantiated”.

Singh in a joint statement with Manipur Director General of Police (DGP) Rajiv Singh, on Sep 26 said the input of infiltration of 900 trained Kuki militants from Myanmar to carry out attacks on Meiteis on Sep 28 could not be substantiated on the ground.

The memorandum also demanded an expedited Suspension of Operation (SoO) negotiation with the Kuki-Zo insurgent groups.
Armed miscreants fired indiscriminately at Mongbung Meitei village from nearby hilltops and surrounding dense forests on Sep 28, prompting retaliation from village volunteers.

Women, children, and elderly people were removed to safer places following the violence, police said in a statement. No casualties have been reported in the violence, it added.

Notably, since May last year, Manipur has witnessed clashes between Meitei and Kuki communities, which has claimed over 220 lives so far and displaced at least 50,000 people, many of them still living in relief centers.