The Director General of Police (DGP) of Manipur has requested the Manipur High Court to close the contempt case, where it was accused of failing to implement an earlier order to maintain status quo at a proposed burial site for 35 Kuki-Zomi people killed in the four-month-long ethnic conflict in the State.
A month ago, the Indigenous Tribal Leaders’ Forum (ITLF) and Joint Philanthropic Organizations (JPO) decided to mark three months of the continuing ethnic conflict by burying 35 of the Kuki-Zomi people killed till then. The proposed site was at S. Booljang in Haolai Khopi village located at the edge of Churachandpur and Bishnupur districts.
However, this site also houses a State government sericulture farm.
A day before the proposed burial on August 3, the International Meiteis Forum (IMF), a civil society organisation, approached the High Court and secured an order directing all security authorities to maintain status quo at the land in question, citing that it was government land.
In the contempt petition, the IMF alleged that the security forces had failed to implement the High Court’s order, and accused the Kuki-Zomi people of vandalising government property at the site.
Responding to this, Manipur DGP Rajiv Singh submitted that there had been vandalism at the sericulture farm where Kuki-Zomi people intended to bury their dead, but this incident had taken place on July 25, much before the court’s August 3 order. He added that a First Information Report (FIR) over the incident had already been registered at the Churachandpur Police Station.
The DGP said that after the announcement of the burial, the police had credible inputs of possible escalation of conflict if the burial was allowed to happen. Accordingly, after the High Court’s order, sufficient security arrangements had been made and there had been no incident of vandalism or demolition of any structure at the site since then, the State police chief said in the counter-affidavit dated August 29.
While the DGP has responded to the contempt petition, requesting that the case be closed, the Indian Army, the Union government, and top officials of the State government, who are also respondents in the case, are yet to file their response, according to the advocates for the petitioners. In an August 30 hearing, a Bench of Acting Chief Justice M.V. Muralidaran and Justice A. Guneshwar Sharma, which was hearing the case, had noted that certain respondents had sought time to file their counter-affidavits, posting the next date for September 11. Directions were also issued to serve notice upon the ITLF and the JPO.
After the High Court had, in a dramatic hearing at 6 a.m., ordered status quo on August 3, the ITLF had said they had decided to postpone the burial by five days after receiving a request from the Home Minister, and sought transfer of the sericulture farmland to them for the burial in the meantime, along with other demands.
In days, leaders of the ITLF met Home Minister Amit Shah in Delhi, where they were assured that the fate of the land would not be decided without their inputs, but it was suggested they look for an alternate site, The Hindu had reported at the time. The ITLF leaders made no promises.
The burial remains postponed to this day. The bodies of the deceased remain at the morgue in Churachandpur Medical College. Leaders of the ITLF have said that the site at the entrance of the district was important because they wanted the memorial burial site to be the first thing that was seen while entering.
ITLF spokesperson Ginza Vualzong said they had not yet decided if they wanted to pick an alternate site for the burial. Regardless, they would want to wait for the bodies of Kuki-Zomi people in Imphal’s morgues to be sent back before conducting the burial memorial service, Mr. Vualzong added.
