Things are not looking good for the chief minister of Manipur, Okram Ibobi Singh. The United Progressive Alliance at the Centre appears to be perturbed at the way things are going in the state, in spite of the fact that Mr Singh’s is a Congress-led government. That Mr Singh’s own legislators are discontented with him has sent the worst signals to the Centre. Charged with badly managed governance, corruption, and an inability to control the increasing lawlessness in the state, the chief minister had 18 legislators coming out openly against him. Although he has managed to win back six of them, he is still burdened with the criticism against him. Ironically, this is Mr Singh’s second term as chief minister; his first was marked by gradually returning stability in the troubled state.

No one can fault Mr Singh for his calculation that unless militant activity in the state is under control, Manipur will be unable to take advantage of development initiatives. Yet his flat statement that militants must die for Manipur to be saved expresses an attitude that seems to be encouraging violence rather than frightening it away. The most recent sequence of fire and counter-fire was started off by the murder of 15 migrant workers in mid-March by firing squads of yet unidentified extremist outfits. The police have since killed seven militants in encounters that were allegedly staged. This charge is accompanied by the usual suspicion that some of those killed were not militants at all. But in Chandel, thousands of people are protesting against the government’s failure to identify and punish the killers of two teenage girls and a young man on Holi. Perhaps Mr Singh’s strong statement was a defence against a situation getting rockier by the day. Reports suggest that the state’s chief secretary has mentioned to the cabinet secretary that underground groups are commanding great clout; regular extortions by them are common. The violence is often bewildering: police commandos recently shot down a member of the Manipur Rifles. The man was a surrendered militant, and the police claimed, after the event, that he had continued with his extremist links. Within the complicated dynamics set in motion by a sequence of violence, simply calling for a killing of militants could become a recipe for disaster. Mr Singh may need to think out calmer ways of conducting governance.