GUWAHATI An apex organisation of Nagas in Manipur has asked the Meitei and Kuki-Zo communities to keep the Nagas out of their war.
The Nagas are increasingly becoming victims of an ethnic battle they are not involved in, the United Naga Council (UNC) said while issuing a list of atrocities committed on the Nagas both in the Meitei-dominated Imphal Valley and the hills inhabited primarily by the Kuki-Zo people.
Meiteis, Nagas, and Kuki-Zos are the principal communities of Manipur. The Nagas decided on a “position of neutrality” since the ethnic conflict between the Meiteis and Kuki-Zomis broke out on March 3, 2023.
‘Collateral damage’
The first “collateral damage” was on May 24 when four Naga women from Ukhrul were attacked and molested by a mob in Imphal. A Liangmai Naga house was burnt down at Leimakhong by the Kukis on June 18 while a Maring Naga woman was shot dead in Imphal on July 16, the UNC said in a statement on February 2.
“A Liangmai farmer was beaten by the Kuki Revolutionary Army on Imphal-Tamei Road on September 5 for refusing to pay illegal tax and a Kuki National Front member fired at a Naga leader in Kangpokpi on September 27. Three Tangkhul (Naga) men were beaten up by armed Meiteis in Imphal on December 3,” the UNC said.
On December 11, two Rongmei Naga girls were thrashed in Bishnupur Bazaar (Imphal Valley) and a Naga driver from Tamenglong received a similar treatment in Imphal. A week later, four Naga girls working at a beauty parlour in Imphal were abducted, the UNC said.
Within the space of two days in January, a Tangkhul boy and two Zeliangrong men were kidnapped from Imphal’s Mantripukhri and Bishnupur district respectively, the UNC said.
Roads blocked
If that were not enough, roads leading to Naga villages have been cut off or blocked and armed Kuki extremists and women have been checking, frisking, and extorting from Nagas along the National Highways in the hills. Radical Meitei groups and Meira Paibis (women vigilantes) have been similarly frisking, looting, abducting, and extorting Nagas in the Imphal Valley, the UNC pointed out.
“Churches have been burnt and demolished, and sacrilegious acts committed inside religious places of worship by the radicalised Meiteis in the name of waging war against a community,” the UNC said.
The organisation said the “common admission of mistaken identity has been cited” in all these acts of “violence, intimidation, disrespect, and insult”.
“In the interest of peace despite the extreme provocations, Nagas have addressed the many sensitive situations and sought to resolve them through customary laws and practices. Yet time and again, our people have been attacked with impunity, making a mockery of the many agreements and resolutions for restoration of peace and good relations,” the UNC said.
“The Meitei legislators, who submitted to the Arambai Tenggol in the January 24 Kangla capitulation cannot claim anymore to be the government of the entire State of Manipur and has limited its powers, functions, and relevance to the Valley and the Meitei community only,” the apex Naga body said.
“Not to speak of reigning in the non-state actors, it has allowed itself to be dictated and co-opted into a radicalised organisation. It is no wonder that the attacks on Nagas in Imphal Valley have not been prevented nor addressed with State instruments as it should be with a State government in place,” it said.
“The Meitei legislators and the government of India owe it to the people of India to explain what it has been doing for the last nine months with the situation going from bad to worse day by day, while Nagas have become victims of its neutrality to the conflict,” the UNC said.
Restraint urged
The organisation asked the Meiteis and Kuki-Zo communities to immediately desist from targeting, provoking, and attacking the Nagas, their homes, and properties in the Imphal Valley and the peripheral hill areas.
“Should this appeal go disrespected, we will have no option but to call upon the Nagas to vacate the Imphal Valley to take up appropriate measures thereafter. Similarly, should the Kuki-Zo group continue with their targeting of Nagas, free access to Naga towns and villages and free passage across Naga areas will have to be prohibited,” the UNC said.
