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New Delhi, June 16, 2023 (PPI-OT): A group of 550 civil society groups and eminent citizens have said that Manipur is burning today due to divisive politics by the Bharatiya Janata Party governments at the Centre and the state. The group in a statement also urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to break his “deafening silence” on the matter and take accountability of the situation.
Manipur has been witnessing ethnic clashes between the Meitei and Kuki communities since May 3 which have left more than 100 persons dead, over 300 injured and thousands displaced. Nearly 60,000 are taking shelter in 350 relief camps. The violence broke out after thousands of people participated in a protest march to oppose the demand of the Meiteis to be included in the Scheduled Tribes category.
The statement has been endorsed by civil society groups including the People’s Union for Civil Liberties, National Alliance of People’s Movements, Bhagat Singh Ambedkar Students Organisation and All India Union of Forest Working People as well as Rajya Sabha MP Manoj Kumar Jha, activists Kavita Srivastava, Brinda Adige and Cedric Prakash, academics Nandini Sundar and Gauhar Raza and journalists Anand Patwardhan and John Dayal.
In the statement, the group said that the situation has been grim since the BJP government started removing alleged “illegal immigrants” from reserve forest areas, declaring them “encroachers”. The alleged immigrants, however, claim that have been living in Manipur since the 1970s. The statement said, “Characteristic of its modus operandi across the country, the BJP is once again exacerbating the age-old ethnic tensions between communities for its own political gain.” it added, “Clearly, the role of BJP lies in using force and coercion to entrench its foothold in the state. Pretending to be an ally to both the communities, it is only widening the chasm of historical tensions between them without any effort till date to facilitate a dialogue towards resolution.”
The signatories of the statement claimed that the Meitei majoritarian groups (mostly Hindus) like Arambai Tenggol and Meitei Leepun have perpetuated violence against Kukis (Christians) through “hate-speech and supremacist displays of impunity”. “Both groups vilify the Kuki community as ‘illegal outsiders’ and ‘narco terrorists’,” they said.
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