Following is the unedited statement of Nagaland’s Rising People’s Party on the ethnic violence between the Meitei and the Kuki communities in the State of Manipur
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The blame for the recent ethnic clash between the majority Meitei community and the Kuki tribals lies squarely with the Chief Minister N. Biren Singh. According to an Outlook article dated July 9, 2021, the Chief Minister was stated to have remarked, “All lands belong to the state government.” With this exclusive statement the CM showed that he’s simply the Chief Minister of Imphal Valley. Later, he dehumanized the Kukis as poppy cultivators and drug warlords. Thirdly, he branded the Kukis wholesale as illegal immigrants.
The poppy argument given by Biren Singh is fallacious given that poppy is also cultivated in Naga inhabited districts. The Nagas too are under the ATSUM banner, now spearheading against the inclusion of Meiteis in the ST list, and the Naga majority districts of Ukhrul, Senapati, Chandel, and Tamenlong participated in the ATSUM rally held on May 3. And whereas only the Kukis were targeted.
Riots are chaotic; so the burning question in everyone’s mind is how come the Kukis were so quickly identified by the mobs for surgical strike in a densely populated Imphal valley? This riot was an anti-Kuki pogrom. For one, after the riots started on May 3, the Chief Minister did nothing, at least for the next 24 hours, when mobs in Imphal valley started targeting Kuki homes and Churches. Rather, according to reports, the Manipur police commandoes aided the mobs by doing nothing when the dwellings of the Kuki tribals were being burnt down. Not surprisingly, on May 4, the DGP P. Doungel IPS of Kuki ethnicity was relinquished of all authority and the overall operational command of the police force was handed over to ADGP Ashutosh Sinha IPS, also reporting to the Security Advisor, GoM, Kuldiep Singh. No reasons were given for scapegoating Mr. Doungel.
The Rising People’s Party is of the opinion that the Chief Minister N. Biren Singh should resign. His credibility has been tarnished beyond repair and no amount of peace-building can restore the sense of normalcy under his watch. President’s Rule should be imposed in the state so that all those responsible for the atrocities can be booked and prosecuted.
Lastly, the RPP condemns the Christian Kuki Vs Hindu Meitei narrative of the riots and the propaganda fed by Hindi-speaking narrators that that the Christians are slaughtering Hindus in the state. Nothing can be further from the truth.
