Mutual accommodation key to peace in Manipur

THESE are among Manipur’s darkest times. A month and a half after a bloody feud between two of its major communities the Meiteis and the Kukis broke out, there is still no sign of normalcy in sight. Although no longer widespread, sporadic violence and mayhem in the foothills where villages of the two communities rub shoulders once in friendship and now in bitter enmity are still being reported.

Around 120 lives have been lost and an estimated 45,000 people are now living in community-run relief camps. Due to the impression that the state is incapable of restoring normalcy, the initial respite from fear of violence among many in these camps has given way to despair. Now, this despair is beginning to turn into anger capable of fuelling further escalation of the conflict. Or else, it can also end up being directed at the establishment. The emerging popular impression is that while the state government is clueless, the Centre lacks commitment.

In a disturbing development, the two warring sides now perceive government forces as partisan. The Kukis think state police constabularies, including the armed Manipur Rifles, favour the Meiteis, while the latter are convinced that Central paramilitary forces, in particular the Assam Rifles (AR), support the Kukis. A completely avoidable ugly confrontation on June 2 between Manipur police commandos and a unit of the AR which almost resulted in a gunfight has made things worse.

In this incident, a detachment of the AR arrived and provocatively blocked off the office of the Sub-Divisional Police Officer (SDPO), Sugnu, parking two armoured personnel carriers at its gate. When things were poised to get out of hand, the AR team retreated. In all likelihood, this was just a localised friction created by an overzealous post commander; nonetheless, it left in its wake very damaging optics, particularly because this happened just two days after Union Home Minster Amit Shah’s visit to the state.

In a welcome step, as promised by Shah, a three-member inquiry committee headed by former Gauhati High Court Chief Justice Ajai Lamba has been formed to establish the causes of the crisis and fix responsibility. However, another initiative of setting up a 51-member peace committee headed by the Governor, Anusuiya Uikey, is running into early but expected hiccups, and many on the list are withdrawing. The allegations are that there are too many people of known political affiliations in it.

Kuki members named in the committee have also objected to the inclusion of Chief Minister N Biren Singh, who they claim is anti-Kuki and a mastermind of the present crisis. The inclusion of the CM in this committee, however, indicates that the Centre is not inclined to replace him or impose the President’s rule in the state, quite contrary to anticipation by many, probably because this is a BJP-ruled state.

The present crisis is also revealing the complex matrix of ethnic relationships in the state, particularly between its three major communities Nagas, Kukis and Meiteis. It is clear now that the fault lines go beyond ethnic boundaries. Hence, there is also a hill-valley divide which corresponds roughly with the tribal-non-tribal divide, in which Nagas and Kukis are on one side and the Meiteis on the other. The hills form 90 per cent of the state’s landmass and are deemed exclusive for those recognised as Scheduled Tribes (ST). The valley (10 per cent of the landmass) is where the non-tribal Meiteis are confined; it is open to settlement by any Indian, including hill tribes. A growing section of the Meiteis is now demanding ST status for their community as well, claiming that this would level out perceived discrepancies.

Both Nagas and Kukis are opposed to this demand, but this has not given the two any closer fraternal ties. In the May 3 rally to oppose the Meitei demand, Nagas did not cross the red line in their relationship with Meiteis, unlike Kukis in Churachandpur district going on an arson rampage on Meitei settlements after a rumour spread that a Kuki war memorial site had been burnt down by Meiteis. The state is now amid a raging inferno from the fire that spread from that afternoon. Despite ‘feelers’ from Kukis for an alliance to make this a hill-versus-valley conflict, it is apparent that Nagas have decided to remain neutral.

But this neutrality is nuanced. On June 9, Manipur’s 10 Naga legislators met the Union Home Minister for consultations. They assured him of their help in bringing back normalcy to the state, but added that if concessions were to be made to the Kuki demand for a separate administration, no land that Nagas considered as theirs must be touched.

Since Kuki villages are spread across the state’s hill districts, and because Nagas consider all hill districts except Churachandpur as their ancestral domain, this assertion obviously will be a wet blanket to dampen the Kuki demand, even in the very unlikely circumstance of Meiteis agreeing to the proposal. Indeed, in the 1990s, a decision of the United Naga Council to evict residents of Kuki villages whom the Nagas consider to be tenants on their land resulted in a bloody conflict costing more than 800 lives.

This neutrality is reminiscent of what Herbert B Swope wrote in his Pulitzer Prize-winning articles from Germany in 1916 for the New York World, reproduced in the first volume of Outstanding International Press Reporting (edited by Heinz-Dietrich Fischer). Swope said Germans at the time were bitter about America’s proclaimed neutrality, a year before America joined World War I, because they felt American neutrality towards Germans came from the head, while with the Allies, it was determined by the heart.

Nagas have indicated they are not ready to side with Kukis in this conflict, but this does not mean they have no differences with the Meiteis. The challenge before Manipur and its people, therefore, is to work for a consensus on structural administrative adjustments as and when the current fratricidal frenzy ends. In a state home to 34-plus recognised linguistic communities, peace will be premised on mutual accommodation within what is their shared destiny.