why blood stained the lives in Manipur?

 

It was Ashish Nandy who once strikingly said and which later became a quintessential quote that

 ' In India the choice could never be between chaos and stability, but between manageable and unmanageable chaos, between humane and inhuman anarchy, and between tolerable and intolerable disorder.' the month of May 2023 provided the evidence of the same when the two communities in north eastern state of Manipur namely Meitei and tribal community of Kuki  brawled over the issue of resources and political identity whose trigger point came by two incidences which preceded the ongoing flight of Kuki from state of Manipur to neighbouring state of Mizoram for refuge. 

Believed to be one of the lost tribes of Israel, Kuki have been living in hill areas of Manipur for centuries and have been recognized as scheduled tribe with distinct culture and identity of their own though they are part of large umbrella of Zo community. forest rights act provides them with necessary safeguard against intrusion of majority non-tribal Meitei community who holds the valley. But in year 2022 after returning to power again the chief minister N Birendra Singh who belongs to Meitei community took strong position against illegal poppy cultivation in hills and then began the war on drugs which eventually led to search parties walking days to reach hills and destroy the poppy plantation. The initial evidences showed that most of the poppy cultivators are from Kuki community. The war on drugs led to arrest of more than 1000 people but lack of deliberation faltered the effectiveness of police action and only fuelled distrust in Meitei chief minister.

But the trigger was not the war on drugs though it created a conducive atmosphere for ethnic disturbances. The last nail in the coffin came in April 2023 when Manipur high court's single judge bench directed state govt to consider the Meitei community's demand of being included in scheduled tribe list and recommend same to ministry of tribal affairs and 4-week deadline was given to come up with a response. This triggered the tribal population of Manipur particularly Kuki and Naga community which enjoys ST status and are fearful that the inclusion of the majority Meitei would lead to loss of land and resources. It took supreme court one and a half month to term the order of high court as 'obnoxious' but the damage was too big for the bandage to work. 

'resources' are key when it comes to finding solution to any conflict and it only exacerbates when it comes to resource crunch states like Manipur. The geography of Manipur is such that 80% of the population of which the majority is Meitei lives in the valley which is merely 10% of Manipur’s geography while the rest of the 80% Manipur is hills which is home to most tribal population. The forest right Act has made it difficult for any nontribal and in case of Manipur particularly the Meitei to buy piece of land beyond densely populated valleys. So, getting the ST status would open ample land for Meitei's to buy. 

Union home minister's visit last month shown some sign of resolution of conflict when most of civil society organizations held talks with minister but peace could not be established as it requires local tribal leadership to come on board without interference of any non-state actor from beyond the borders. Tribal communities are not homogenous as we perceive them to be so it takes painstakingly long time to converge on an issue where power is distributed till the last tribal leader. Blurring the reality of diversity in north eastern population does not help anyone because peace in north eastern state has become a key to national governments active involvement of Indo -pacific through 'act east policy' which holds great promise for north eastern states.

The Kuki-Meitei conflict is also a litmus test for India’s federalism and its ability to handle multi -ethnic sub national sentiments without hurting the decade long process of national integration. the 'asymmetric federalism' as it is being called holds the promise that power sharing at local level would resolve the long-standing tension among community. Now the politics of north east revolves around the question of resources and who gets what. So usually, state leadership align themselves with union govt irrespective of differences of broader ideology among national party. And national parties also are smart enough to keep the ideological battle out of picture when it comes to dealing with north east. So, the tricky balance of resources is at play and the question of granting ST status to majority Meitei community that too without proper and comprehensive deliberation with other communities only fuels distrust not only towards the other community but also towards the state machinery.

what not to be forgotten is that lives are being lost and dreams are being shattered. So, any solution must keep people of both communities at centre and they themselves should lead the way for Delhi and Imphal to provide state assistance and healing.