On May 3, the Manipur ethnic conflict completed three years. On May 3, 2023, a rally by hill tribes against a demand for scheduled tribe status by the predominantly Hindu Meiteis turned violent at Churachandpur district. Images and videos of the violence saturated the internet and, by evening, the violence spread to pockets of Imphal. By May 4, mayhem engulfed Imphal and several other towns in both the valley and the hills.
Quite tellingly, hostility remained restricted to Meiteis and Kuki-Zos, although Nagas also held the same rally. But this was ignored by most outside commentators locked in on conflict templates of Hindus versus Christians, non-tribals vs tribals and so on. Developing Naga-Kuki violent clashes have exposed how woefully short these templates were. The fear is that this new front can become far more disastrous, given that Nagas and Kukis share virtually the same living space. Nagas claim they are the custodians of the land and they had allowed Kukis to settle there as tenants. Kukis dispute this.
A lucrative narcotics trade is a driver in the conflict and third-party vested interests curate anarchy that facilitates this trade. The extent of illegal poppy cultivation in the state, according to official estimates from satellite imagery, is over 16,000 hectares. The infamous Golden Triangle has expanded into Manipur.
An atmosphere of deep mistrust among communities and different stakeholders in the conflict and government security agencies is an unfortunate consequence. Meiteis and Nagas suspect Central forces, particularly the Assam Rifles, of using Kukis as proxy fighters to undermine them, while the Kukis see state police as biased against them. A single spark can still ignite infernos. An incident of a mortar shell fired at Tronglaobi village in Bishnupur district bordering Churachandpur in the wee hours of April 7, killing two children of a BSF personnel in their sleep and injuring their mother, illustrate this.
This Meitei village is flanked by the Thangjing range to the west and is surrounded by several security posts. The area is under the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, which has been lifted from valley areas closer to Imphal city. The morning after the mortar incident, a mob, incensed by suspicion of Central forces using their alleged proxies in the attack, stormed the nearby CRPF camp, and in retaliatory fire, three were killed.
On April 14, CISF and police found a haul of 6.74 kilogramme of brown sugar at the Imphal airport from a passenger from Kwakta village, a little way from Tronglaobi. Later on the same day, some men heading to Kwakta in two civil vehicles ran into a Meitei mob blockading the road at Thinungei village. All except one in these vehicles were non-locals. They were in plain clothes, carried firearms, identified themselves as Assam Rifles personnel but declined to show their identity cards. When the mob got aggressive, the rear vehicle u-turned and drove away to return with some policemen. By then the mob was beyond pacification. They attacked the men, thankfully not fatally, and torched vehicles. According to locals, the captured arms of the passengers were returned the next day. Police later clarified miscommunication caused the incident, and the men were on a narcotics raid mission.
During the confrontation, a woman in the mob noticed the lone local man and raised alarm that he was Kuki and the men were likely gunrunners. The man turned out to be from the Kom community. A visiting columnist lapped up this cue to portray the confrontation as a fallout of communal bigotry, diverting attention from other troubling questions. Why were these armed security personnel travelling to Kwakta in civil vehicles and plain clothes? Are Assam Rifles now tasked with narcotics control, or is there more to the story?
In Manipur’s rush of catastrophic events, the spotlight soon shifted to another outrage. On April 18, a convoy of Tangkhul Naga passenger vehicles was ambushed along the Imphal-Ukhrul highway, allegedly by Kuki militants, killing two and injuring many, pushing the already dangerous Naga-Kuki friction closer to an explosion. Fresh torrents of conspiracy theories also followed.
Pradip Phanjoubam is editor, Imphal Review of Arts and Politics
