More and more unanswered questions : Playing the victim card
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: June 10, 2023 -

More than 30 days since Manipur went up in flames and far from coming anywhere near a solution, more and more unanswered questions have emerged.

Not that one expects all the answers to the posers but these questions have been uncomfortably hanging for long.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah came, saw, met, talked to the press and left leaving a ‘after 14 days’ riddle while leaving the ‘abrogate SoO’ call in suspense.

Not that the Union Home Minister did not speak about SoO but the master strategist that he is, he left it shrouded under the line ‘stern action will be taken if they are found violating the SoO ground rules’.

This line continues to hang in the air prompting Rajya Sabha MP Leishemba Sanjaoba to take the trouble of personally writing to the Union Home Minister to abrogate the SoO pact.

If New Delhi is really serious about taking the ongoing clash to a logical conclusion, then it should give due attention to the written message from the titular King of Manipur, a man who was hand picked by New Delhi to represent Manipur in the Upper House of Parliament.

To rise above the sob and victim story that has been sold so convincingly to the outside world, particularly the pen pushers in some media houses, questions should also be raised on how so many displaced Kuki-Chin people have managed to fly all the way to places like Bengaluru, Delhi and other metros of India and take up residence there as tenants.

Take note, majority of the displaced Meitei people are surviving in relief camps ?

This should throw some light on who are the victims and who are the perpetrators.

How did trouble start at Torbung on May 3 ?

Who lit the first match stick that sent numerous dwelling houses up in flames ?

Who were the people who first had to abandon their houses and take refuge at the places of relatives and friends and later move to relief or refugee camps ?

Whose abandoned houses have been razed to the ground using heavy machinery like JCBs and where ?

Shouldn’t answers to these questions be answered ?

Was the uproar at Churachandpur really a protest against the demand that the Meiteis be granted the Scheduled Tribe status ?

Why did the Tribal Solidarity Rally turn violent only at Churachandpur and quickly spread to Kangpokpi and Moreh, while the said rally wound up peacefully at the Naga dominated districts of Senapati, Ukhrul and Tamenglong ?

Shouldn’t these questions be raised ? And these are questions which have already been raised but till date there have been no answers from anyone.

A look at the changing face of the ongoing clash is also necessary to understand why the demand to abrogate the SoO pact has been raised.

Trouble started at Torbung after houses were set afire by a group of rampaging people from Churachandpur.

Torbung is located 11.2 kilometres away from Churachandpur district headquarters, where the Tribal Solidarity Rally was staged.

How did such a large number of people with ‘violence’ writ large on their faces manage to ‘get a smooth march’ all the way to Torbung ?

As news of the houses being torched and villagers fleeing started doing the round, Imphal retaliated and in no time mobs soon took over.

This was in the evening of May 3.

As is the wont with any mob, the mob movement or mob violence petered out after three or four days, but the embers had still not been completely doused.

Thereafter the story or focus shifted to the foothills where a number of Meitei villages are located and in no time the clash became one between well armed, trained gunmen and the residents of the villages at the foothills assisted by volunteers from other parts of the State.

This is where the demand to abrogate SoO should be understood and trying to dilute the role of well armed, trained people with lines such as ‘stern action will be taken against anyone violating ground rules’ will not work.

This is where Delhi would need to take another look at its SoO strategy.