Denial of justice at the core of Manipur mayhem

Meiteis are usually Hindu and Kukis are Christian. The land dispute in Manipur between the Kukis and the Meiteis traditionally played out on tribal lines and was never a religious identity-based conflict. Nevertheless, the mayhem in the border state opens a vast new vista for China to take on India through another front of misfortune.

Take a close look at the map of North-East India and the combination of geography, demography and cross-border happenings through the years. China must be rejoicing at what all has happened in Manipur over the past more than a month killings, displacement and migration of local residents. It was disturbing to see an ambulance being torched by a mob in Imphal in the name of religion.

Recall the post-1947 days when Sardar Patel and VP Menon united India by making 550 princes, rajas and maharajas scattered across the country sign the Instrument of Accession. Thus was established the most expansive map of India since Aurangzeb’s rule.

And then recall how the Indian political class of a sovereign country divided one state after another over the years to create local mini-empires, based on the divisive policy of hatred. The mantra of division, regrettably, has caught the imagination of a large section of the polity.

It’s a story without an end. The worst part, repeatedly and unfortunately, is the role of the national political leadership and the police it commands and controls.

One cites a few instances to drive home the point. On August 16, 1946, at the behest of the then Muslim League chief Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the Prime Minister of Bengal, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, himself sat in the Police Control Room of Lal Bazaar, Calcutta, to guide fanatic mobs to designated targets and withdrew the police from the sensitive areas of the city to facilitate a massacre. In one dawn-to-dusk period, around 6,000 people died on Calcutta’s streets. This macabre dance of death happened right under the gaze of the police and their political boss.

A precedent was set for the ruling class of India regarding the misuse of the police to achieve political ends. The police became a means to an end, a tool of the emerging goonda rulers in vast swathes of the hinterland.

Fast-forward to March 1984, when Jyoti Basu was the Chief Minister of West Bengal. Conscientious IPS officer Vinod Mehta was murdered by a marauding mob in the Calcutta port area. The then Deputy Speaker of the Assembly, Kalimuddin Shams, was accused of having links with the killers of the then Deputy Commissioner of Police (Port Division). The then CM Basu, who also held the portfolios of Home and Police, and the police force abdicated their duty and responsibility. Those who were supposed to have been taught at the police academy to come to the rescue of their colleagues left them in the lurch. This was a shocking example of malevolent subservience by the uniformed personnel.

It was also a broad-daylight murder of democracy and the Constitution by the CM and the police which served him. The ruling communists showed their contempt for the rule of law.

In Manipur, the police allegedly played a passive partisan role when the ambulance carrying people was torched. If the accusation is true, the following questions need to be answered: Is the Indian Penal Code (IPC) still applicable to Manipur? If yes, why weren’t the relevant sections of the IPC invoked to bring to book the erring cops? If the India of 2023 is hell bent on following in the perilous footsteps of the then Bengal PM Suhrawardy and the then CM Basu, let the country understand that Manipur is a sensitive border state which is becoming increasingly vulnerable to the nefarious moves of China led by President Xi Jinping, who will turn 70 on June 15, the day the Galwan clash took place in 2020.

Indeed, Manipur today is pregnant with far-reaching ramifications. An ethnically restive home state is detrimental to the morale of Manipuri soldiers who are among the troops defending India’s borders. It is imperative to take a serious note of their agony.

For the local as well as the Central armed constabulary, the duty to go by the rule book more often than not takes a beating due to the vested interests of the political class to attain and retain power at all costs.

A deep sense of prolonged denial of justice is the dangerous fallout of the Manipur tragedy. If the sense of belonging en masse turns into a sense of betrayal and results in the alienation of an entire ethnic or religious group, be prepared for a ‘free-for-all’ jungle raj to eclipse the rule of law, the Constitution, justice, fair play and democracy.

The adage “justice must not only be done, but also appear to have been done” is the need of the hour. India cannot be in the election mode throughout the year in one state or another.

Good governance is the sine qua non of peace in the North-East, where ‘Mao reincarnate’ Xi is keen to implement Captain Basil Henry Liddell Hart’s Strategy: The Indirect Approach. Money, machine guns and material are being pumped into Manipur through Myanmar to tie down a sizeable number of Indian forces to deal with a civil war, instead of letting them prepare for a war with the Chinese.