Imphal:

On speculation about a possible leadership change in crisis-hit Manipur, Chief Minister N Biren Singh said that it was not in his hands and his focus is on solving the problem in the state.

“Staying on as Chief Minister or resigning is not in my hands,” Mr Singh told NDTV amid reports that a section of MLAs from his party and its allies are pushing for his removal.

Speculations about a leadership change have been rife since the BJP lost both seats in the Lok Sabha elections. Congress candidates wrested the seats from the ruling BJP and its ally Naga People’s Front (NPF).

Mr Singh attributed the Lok Sabha mandate to the prevailing situation and acknowledged public anger over his handling of the crisis.

“BJP’s vote percentage is not low. What we expected, we got. This time we got more votes than last time but lost due to the prevailing situation,” he said.

“I know people are angry with me for our handling of the situation. We accept it. The situation is very complex. We are not fighting with an identified enemy,” the Chief Minister added.

Tensions heightened in Manipur after ethnic violence between the Meiteis and Kukis erupted on May 3 last year, yet previous attempts to sway the party leadership have failed to yield results. Over 200 people have died and 50,000 have been displaced in the ethnic violence, which has continued to fester.

The Kuki groups are now demanding a separate Union Territory, a demand that Mr Singh downplayed.

“Out of 16 districts, disturbance is only 2-3 districts. The crisis is not that big. There is public unrest, but I can proudly say that schools, business and traffic are working well,” he told NDTV.

“Manipur is 2000 years old, and is now a proud state of India. Demand is a demand, but it cannot happen,” he added.

Mr Singh also said that the Manipur issue is on the priority list of the new central government, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The situation in Manipur has been brought up forcefully again by the opposition in the Parliament, which has found a new voice after it managed to defy all expectations and stop the BJP short not just of its target of 370 Lok Sabha seats but even of the majority mark of 272. The INDIA alliance now has 232 members in the Lok Sabha and the BJP has 240, with allies making up the rest of the NDA’s 293.

Imphal:

Even as the whispers about a possible leadership change in Manipur continue to get louder, Chief Minister Biren Singh has admitted that some MLAs from his party and its allies are in Delhi, but rubbished talk of their visit having anything to do with his resignation.

Over the past few days, there have been reports that a section of MLAs from the BJP and its allies, Naga People’s Front (NPF), National People’s Party (NPP) and JDU, are pushing for the chief minister to step down. 

Sources said that efforts to convince the BJP leadership to replace Mr Singh have been mounted several times since he became the chief minister in 2017 and gathered steam after the ethnic violence broke out on May 3 last year, but yielded no results. 

What’s different this time, however, is that the BJP has had to pay an electoral cost, having lost both of Manipur’s Lok Sabha seats to the Congress in the just-concluded polls.

On Friday, the chief minister said there had been a meeting with NDA allies – who have 53 of the state’s 60 Assembly seats between them, with the BJP alone accounting for 37 – the previous night, and it was decided that a memorandum for lasting peace in Manipur would be submitted to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“We also discussed going to Delhi for a courtesy call with PM Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah. The MLAs entrusted me with getting the appointment, but since the Parliament is on and things are so hectic, I thought why should I disturb? When the meeting happens, I will also go. But some people have gone ahead. This has nothing to do with a resignation. Around 35 MLAs were present yesterday and we signed the memorandum,” Mr Singh said.

“We are also grateful to the PM and Mr Shah that they have put Manipur on their list of priorities for the first 100 days (of the new NDA term). Mr Shah has also held meetings with various agencies and our gratitude was part of the resolution,” he added. 

The situation in Manipur has been brought up forcefully again by the opposition, which has found a new voice after it managed to defy all expectations and stop the BJP short not just of its target of 370 Lok Sabha seats but even of the majority mark of 272. The INDIA alliance now has 232 members in the Lok Sabha and the BJP has 240, with allies making up the rest of the NDA’s 293. 

The ‘Almost’ Resignation 

Last June, when the pressure on his government was near its peak, the chief minister had almost quit. A minister had claimed he has left for the governor’s house with his resignation, but had turned back because of a human chain formed by hundreds of women in his support outside his residence in Imphal. It had also been claimed that his resignation letter was snatched from two ministers and torn up by people who wanted Mr Singh to remain the chief minister.

The opposition had dubbed the entire sequence of events a carefully orchestrated drama. 

Over 200 people have died and 50,000 have been displaced in the ethnic violence, which has continued to fester. 

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Imphal:

When the clock struck 4 am in Manipur’s capital Imphal, a team of five people took one last look at the boxes they had loaded the night before in their SUV, and drove out towards a medicine collection point.

The boxes contained hundreds of packets of oral rehydration solution (ORS), cartons of multivitamin syrup, and common over-the-counter medicines that people in relief camps would need.

The members of the Delhi Meitei Forum (DMF), an independent civil society group of Manipur’s Meitei community living in the national capital, donated the medicines to be sent to Heirok in Thoubal district, and Jiribam district, bordering Assam, where violence broke out in the last two weeks.

Jiribam had been peaceful for more than a year until the recent flare-up, despite ethnic tensions between the Meitei community and the Kuki tribes in other parts of the state.

After giving the medicines, the DMF members headed out to a designated distribution spot, where they took out cartons of school bags that they had bought with funds donated by DMF members, who are from all walks of life and professions, many of whom have been recognised for public service.

Many students and their parents who are living in different relief camps came to the spot and met the DMF members, who handed over the school bags and notebooks.

All the students are residents of Khumujamba Meitei Leikai in Churachandpur district, from where they fled when the violence began. They are now staying at relief camps in areas including Mekola, Moirang, and the Imphal-based non-profit TAKDO.

“Some of the students are in government schools, some in private schools in Imphal and Hiyangthang,” a key DMF member told NDTV.

The member said in the spirit of the ‘Aatmanirbhar (self-reliant) Bharat’ theme, they bought the bags from the local company Romi Bag Industries, and notebooks from Sucheta Book Store in Imphal.

The DMF members had contributed whatever they could, from Rs 100, Rs 500 to Rs 1,000, to buy the items and medicines.

Despite the hardships, 93 per cent students in Manipur passed the class 10 board exams in May – the highest in the last 10 years. The Manipur Board of Secondary Education had announced that over 37,000 students gave the test, and many living in relief camps passed. The pass percentage in 2022 was 76 per cent, and in 2023 it was 82 per cent.

On its social media pages, the DMF says it is a group of “law-abiding Meitei citizens of India living in Delhi. The group is not affiliated to any other organisation or body. It’s a completely independent group working for the well-being of the Meitei community.”

DMF members say they have been carrying out activities frequently to help internally displaced people in Manipur.

Imphal:

The Assam Rifles in a statement on Tuesday refuted allegations by a tribal group that said refugees from war-torn Myanmar have been found allegedly building houses in Manipur’s Tengnoupal district without informing the state authorities.

The alleged illegal settlement was found between pillar number 82 and 89 near the border with Myanmar by volunteers, the Maring tribe group said.

The Assam Rifles, however, denied the existence of such “illegal settlements”.

Some refugees have indeed taken shelter in that area due to the war-like situation in Myanmar; however, they are immediately repatriated as the security situation improves across the Indo-Myanmar border, the Assam Rifles said in the statement shared with local media.

In fact, the accommodation arrangements for the refugees consist of self-help, bare essential thatched huts with polythene covers, the Assam Rifles said, adding the state administration is fully aware of the presence of refugees in the area and has also collected their biometric data.

The Rilram Area Maring Organisation, or RAMO, had said it sent out volunteers to check their villages near border pillar numbers 82 to 89, following reports of a significant number of Myanmar refugees pouring into Maring tribe’s areas in Tengnoupal district.

RAMO said they told the authorities they found a considerable presence of Myanmar refugees building houses and other structures. The areas RAMO volunteers visited were Chanringphai, Choktong, N Satang, and Sangtong villages under Lamlong Khunou circle.

Village chiefs in the area have complained they were no longer able to manage the influx of refugees from Myanmar, the RAMO volunteers said.

Manipur has been caught in an ethnic strife since May 2023 between the Kuki tribes and the Meiteis.

Chandel:

An earthquake of magnitude 3.5 on the Richter Scale struck Manipur’s Chandel in the early hours of Sunday, according to the National Centre for Seismology (NCS).

The epicentre of the earthquake was located at Latitude 23.9 N and Longitude 94.10 E and a depth of 77 kilometres, the NCS stated.

The earthquake occurred on Sunday at 2:28 am (IST), according to NCS.

“EQ of M: 3.5, On: 02/06/2024 02:38:50 IST, Lat: 23.91 N, Long: 94.10 E, Depth: 77 Km, Location: Chandel, Manipur,” the NCS said in a post on ‘X’.

No casualties have been reported so far. No damages have been detected as of now.

Further details are awaited.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Guwahati/Agartala:

Several northeastern states, including Tripura, Manipur, Mizoram, and Assam (southern part), remained cut off from the rest of the country by rail as railway tracks were waterlogged and damaged after landslides triggered by incessant rain in the aftermath of Cyclone Remal, officials said on Wednesday.

A Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) official said that railway tracks were inundated due to heavy rains or damaged in at least ten places in the New Haflong-Bandarkhal section under the Lumding division in southern Assam’s Dima Hasao district, which is a connecting route to south Assam, Tripura, Manipur, and Mizoram.

“Our engineers and workers are working round-the-clock to restore rail services but heavy rain and adverse weather conditions badly affected the restoration work,” the NFR official told IANS.

He said that full-fledged work could not be started until the rain stopped.

The NFR had cancelled a large number of express, passenger and goods trains bound for south Assam, Tripura, Manipur, and Mizoram since Tuesday.

According to the NFR official, passenger and goods train services have been affected in the region since April 25 owing to heavy landslides causing damage to railway tracks in the Jatinga Lumpur-New Harangajao section under the Lumding division after heavy rains lashed the mountainous Dima Hasao district.

Considering the damaged railway tracks and weak soil in the region, the NFR recently operated a limited number of trains in the daytime on the hilly route, besides regulating long-distance and express trains. The disruptions in services caused a major shortage of transport fuel — petrol and diesel — and other essential goods in southern Assam, Tripura, Mizoram and Manipur. Due to the heavy rain and landslides, highway connectivity was also affected in these states, which are heavily dependent on fuel, essential items, food grains and other commodities from the outside.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Guwahati/Agartala:

Ahead of the approaching severe cyclonic storm “Remal”, disaster management authorities and security forces in various northeastern states have been placed on high alert and the district administrations asked to take advance precautionary steps.

According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD) forecast, Cyclone Remal has made landfall between Sagar Island along West Bengal and Khepupara in Bangladesh, intensifying into a severe cyclone. A maximum sustained wind speed of 110-120 kmph, gusting to 135 kmph, prevails around the cyclone centre.

Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura, Manipur, and Mizoram governments have issued separate advisories and asked the National Disaster Response Force, State Disaster Response Forces, district administrations and other departments to maintain maximum vigilance.

The Assam government has taken measures to ensure the safety and well-being of its citizens. The Assam State Disaster Management Authority (ASDMA) said the IMD has warned of extremely heavy rainfall over Assam along with other northeastern states on May 27 and 28.

An Orange alert has been issued for Dhubri, South Salmara, Bongaigaon, Bajali, Tamulpur, Barpeta, Nalbari, Morigaon, Nagaon, Hojai, and West Karbi Anglong districts and Red Alert for extremely heavy rainfall in Chirang, Goalpara, Baksa, Dima Hasao, Cachar, Hailakandi and Karimganj districts, an ASDMA statement said.

The Tripura government has closed all educational institutions including universities on May 27 and 28.

The state’s Revenue Secretary Brijesh Pandey said in view of Remal’s impact on the coastal region of West Bengal, including Kolkata, all kinds of flight operations in the Kolkata-Agartala route were suspended till 9 a.m. on Monday.

Flight services on other routes — Agartala-Guwahati, Agartala-Delhi, and Agartala-Bengaluru — are operating normally.

The first cyclone in the Bay of Bengal in this pre-monsoon season, it has been named “Remal” (or sand in Arabic), according to a system of naming cyclones in the Indian Ocean region.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Imphal:

The army engaged in a fierce gunfight with suspected insurgents and rescued 75 women of a social and cultural institution in Manipur, according to a statement by the military on Sunday.

The incident happened on May 16. The group of armed people started firing towards Uyok in Leimaram at 10.45 pm, the police said. Leimaram under Bishnupur district is 1.5 km from the nearest hills, and Uyok is right in the foothills.

The Assam Rifles in a post on the microblogging website X said soldiers “brought down heavy fire” on the unknown armed people, during which they also evacuated 75 Meira Paibis, a women-only social and cultural institution of the valley-dominant Meitei community.

The Assam Rifles also posted visual of two soldiers firing a mortar at the suspected insurgents.

The use of mortar to bombard the attackers’ position in the dark indicates the attack by the armed people on Uyok village was so intense that it needed a very strong response, sources said.

The Meira Paibis have thanked the Assam Rifles and the army for evacuating and rescuing them.

ARMY & ASSAM RIFLES SAFELY RESCUE VILLAGERS FROM ARMED ATTACK BY MISCREANTS@adgpi and #AssamRifles safely led the rescue and evacuation of around 75 Meirapaibis during an attack by armed miscreants. The Security Forces repelled the misadventurism by bringing down heavy fire and… pic.twitter.com/Dupal1Q5se

— The Assam Rifles (@official_dgar) May 19, 2024

The hill-dominant Kuki-Zo tribes have set up bunkers on most of the hills surrounding Manipur’s valley areas, where the Meiteis live. The Meiteis have alleged the Kuki-Zo tribes of shooting at anyone including farmers in the foothills without provocation, while the Kuki-Zo tribes have accused the Meiteis of trying to take over hill areas with frequent attacks.

Over 220 have died and thousands have been internally displaced since ethnic violence broke out between the two ethnic communities in May 2023.

The Kuki-Zo tribes have demanded a “separate administration” carved out of Manipur, following the violence. However, the Meiteis have pointed out the Kuki-Zo tribes always wanted a separate land, and so the claim that the May 2023 violence led to the demand for a separate administration is completely bogus.

Around 700 armed miscreants attempted to storm a police camp, and snatched eight sophisticated weapons, over 600 rounds of ammunition, and over half a dozen vehicles from multiple police locations in Imphal on Wednesday evening, according to details accessed by The Hindu.

Three Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel were injured as they tried to stop the miscreants from looting weapons at the 1^st Manipur Reserve Battalion camp. A police source said that three of the eight looted weapons, including AK-47 rifles, have been recovered and that raids are continuing to arrest the accused persons.

Mob attack

Security forces fired tear gas shells and live rounds in the air to disperse the mob, which came mounted on SUVs, according to an internal report prepared by one of the security agencies and accessed by The Hindu.

The mob destroyed computers at the police control room and ransacked several other offices of the police, including those of the Narcotics Affairs Bureau, Additional Director General of Police (Intelligence), Inspector General of Police (Prisons), and the Superintendent of Police (Prisons). They also fired at the office of the Criminal Investigation Department. The vandalism continued from 6 p.m. to 7:45 p.m. on Wednesday.

“A numbers of perpetrators have been arrested and the law will take its own course. Yesterday’s attempt to loot arms and ammunitions at 1st MR (Manipur Reserve) Battalion by armed miscreants was repulsed by combined Security Forces effectively,” the Manipur police posted on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday. “In case they attempted such misadventure in future, they may have to pay heavy price,” it added.

Weapons, equipment looted

The police source said that though there were other incidents of weapons and vehicles being snatched from other locations, the main armoury could not be breached. The report said that bullet proof plates, tear gas guns and wireless sets used by the police were also looted.

More than 5,000 weapons and lakhs of rounds of ammunition have been looted from police armouries in Manipur since the ethnic conflict between the Meitei and Kuki-Zo communities erupted on May 3. Despite multiple warnings by the State government, only a little over 1,400 weapons have been recovered so far.

Another police source said that Aarambai Tengol, a vigilante group, had been posting provocative messages on social media in the past few days.

Seeking army protection

Meanwhile in Moreh, hundreds of Kuki-Zo women and children huddled outside the camps of the Assam Rifles and the Border Security Force, fearing violence after a 15-year-old girl was allegedly physically assaulted by Manipur police commandos on Wednesday night. The girl’s family filed a police complaint against the unidentified commandos on Thursday.

“After the news spread that the police commandos had hit the girl, women and children rushed to the army camps fearing for their safety. In the combing operations in the past two days, men in police uniforms have ransacked homes and even looted church donation boxes. We want an assurance from the army that the combing operation will be done as per law,” a local resident said.

After a lull of a few weeks, tensions have erupted in Manipur again after Chingtham Anand Kumar, a sub-divisional police officer was killed in Moreh on October 30 in “unprovoked firing by armed Kuki militants while he was on duty overseeing the cleaning of the grounds of Eastern Shine School for construction of a helipad, jointly by State force and BSF”, the State government said.

Rising tensions

The border town of Moreh has seen the displacement of its Meitei community. Fearing bias, Kuki-Zo residents have opposed the deployment of Manipur police commandos, stating that only Central security forces or the Army should be posted there. However, the State government has been sending additional teams of Manipur police to the border town for combing operations.

The police source said: “Moreh is part of Manipur and it is the mandate of the State government to deploy the State Police wherever it wants.”

After the officer was killed, additional police teams were rushed to Moreh. A few homes and vehicles belonging to the Kuki-Zo community were burnt down, the source added.

In another post on X, Manipur police said that on November 1, “during the search operations by security forces at Moreh, Tengnoupal district, 44 persons were detained by the security forces at Moreh, Tengnoupal district out of which 32 persons were found to be Myanmarese/Burmese. Further, 10 Myanmarese citizens from Moreh were taken to Foreigner Detention Centre, Sajiwa.”

The ten Kuki-Zo-Hmar legislators of Manipur appealed to the Union Home Ministry to intervene into the matter at once and ensure withdrawal of all the commandos deployed in Moreh and replace them with neutral Central forces.

The legislators said in a statement that while they condoled the loss of life of the police officer in line of duty and understand that the State police may be hard pressed to nab the culprits responsible, they cannot condone the unrestrained illegal and barbaric activities of the commando and State police personnel.

“In the operations that are under way at Moreh, the State Forces resorted to arson, indiscriminate firing, looting of civilian properties, vehicles, household items including valuable ornaments/documents/gold/cash, and unprovoked brutality forcing common people, including women and children to flee into the nearby jungle,” the statement said.

They said the lack of faith in the State forces stemmed from the innumerable instances of their direct involvement in attacking Kuki-Zomi-Hmar villages during the current conflict.

India and Myanmar have a free movement regime (FMR) upto 16 kilometres on either side of the border. Though Manipur government suspended the FMR post the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, people on either side who have shared ethnicity move freely across the porous and unfenced border.