Look for ways to restore normalcy Debunk ‘peace later’ slogan

The tasks before the Government should be clear. There is no indication that Manipur has taken her first step towards normalcy but this is no reason for the Government to sleep over the matter. The much tom tommed Peace Committee that was formed during the initial days of the ethnic clash has been a no starter and perhaps the office of the Governor may look into it and see if a new committee may be formed, drawing people from different walks of life.  The Churachandpur based Indigenous Tribal Leaders’ Forum (ITLF) and the Kangpokpi based Committee on Tribal Unity (CoTU) had coined the slogan, ‘Solution First, Peace Later’, but it still remains to be seen whether the solution they are talking about can be achieved without a semblance of normalcy or peace. Only Delhi can address the call for Separate Administration, but so far the Government of India has not given even the slightest hint that this demand is being considered seriously. On the other hand, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Foreign Minister S Jaishankar had on more than one occasion pointed to the large scale influx from neighbouring Myanmar as one of the prime reasons for the violence that Manipur sees today. In other word, it is the large scale immigration that is responsible for the violence erupting in all its ugliness on May 3, 2023. For reasons which must be obvious to everyone, no Kuki civil society organisation has had the gumption to address the question of large scale immigration or the rapid change in the demographic composition of Manipur. It was way back on May 23, 2002 that a certain Paolienlal Haokip had written in a publication of the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies that about 15,000 Konyak Nagas, 20,000 Kukis and 17000-20000 Chin and Reang tribal were driven out from the then Burma into the Indian States of Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram respectively. This was in 1967 when the then Burmese Government under Ne Win launched the Burma- nisation programme, wrote Paolienlal Haokip. The article came under the heading Burmese Refugees in North East Region of India and the very title of the article should say something significant. A point which Manipur had been raising for some time now. Jobless and  hungry and with no Governmental or international efforts to remedy the plight of the refugees, many of them took to drugs and arms trafficking along the porous Indo-Myanmar border, wrote Paolienlal Haokip. The intent of the article was to highlight the absence of any legislation to deal with refugees back then and fast forward to 2024 or 2023 and it is more than clear that there has been no end to the inflow of immigrants from across the border, especially after the military coup in Myanmar in 2021 and it is more than clear that from trafficking drugs, it has today gone to poppy cultivation, destroying vast tracts of forest land.
Obvious that CoTU and ITLF are not ready to acknowledge the facts and accordingly move on. The two organisations have still not answered why a protest against the policy and programme of the Government should turn towards the Meitei civilians on May 3, 2023. Imphal and the valley areas retaliated only late in the evening of May 3, 2023 and The Sangai Express has already recalled that it was on this very day that a Kuki gentleman, a former MLA, dropped in at the office of this newspaper at about 6.30 pm to inquire about a report, a report that had nothing to do with the rally and the ugly developments thereafter. Spelling out the facts but it remains that Manipur cannot continue like this forever. It is already a year since the clash broke out and surely steps ought to be taken up to put the State back on track. The Peace Committee has been a non-starter, but there is no reason why a new Committee cannot be formed. Involve people from across the ethnic divide, let a person who has the faith and confidence of both the Meiteis and the Kuki-Zos lead the Committee and this is where Delhi may be approached to take up the initiative. Let Raj Bhavan liaise with either side and take the people from both sides along. For over a year Manipur has been burning and the longer the clash continues the more Manipur stands to lose. And when Manipur loses, everyone knows who stand to gain.