Multiple factors led to the ethnic conflict that erupted in Manipur on May 3 that left more than 60 dead, 231 injured, and 1,700 houses, many belonging to tribes of the Kuki group, destroyed. The most recent was a ‘Tribal Solidarity March’, spurred by the Manipur High Court’s March 27 order (issued on April 19) that revived a decade-old demand of a section of the Meitei people that they be granted the Scheduled Tribe status for protecting their “ancestral land, traditions, culture and language”. New Delhi rushed thousands of Central forces to the State as violence spread. An uneasy calm has prevailed over the State ever since, but the equations between communities remain tense.
Manipur, one of the eight northeastern States, covers an area of 22,327 sq. km and has a rich cultural, literary and administrative history. The State’s territory, according to British-era maps in the 1850s, once extended up to the Ningthee or Chindwin river beyond the Kabaw or Kubo Valley in Myanmar. The present-day Manipur can be broadly divided into two valleys that account for a little more than 10% of the landmass and the hills covering the rest.
About 60% of Manipur’s population, largely the non-tribal Meitei, live in the 1,864.44 sq.km Imphal Valley, comprising five districts, almost at the centre of the State. The remaining 40% inhabit the surrounding hills divided into 10 districts besides the 232 sq.km valley of Jiribam, also a district, adjoining southern Assam’s Cachar. Jiribam is the access point of one of the two major National Highways and a railway (partially completed) linking the State’s capital Imphal. The other arterial highway is via Nagaland to the north. Extremism-related and ethnic conflicts have often disrupted vehicular movement on these highways largely through tribal areas, resulting in a fuel, food and medicine scarcity in the Imphal Valley and elsewhere in Manipur. Meiteis, the largest community in Manipur, account for about 53% of the State’s total population of 2.85 million(2011 census). Also known as Meetei or Manipuri, the community is spread across the other northeastern States, Bangladesh, and Myanmar. Their language, Meiteilon, is one of 22 recognised tongues that has been included in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution. Their ancient script, Meitei Mayek, of the sixth-century vintage, is undergoing a process of revival after King Pamheiba made the Vaishnav form of Hinduism the official language of the Manipuri kingdom and Bengali the official script in the early 18th century.
