SHAMEFUL BLUNDERS

BY ALLOWING MANIPUR'S WOUNDS TO FESTER, THE STATE AND CENTRAL GOVERNMENTS HAVE PUSHED ITS PEOPLE TO A POINT OF NO RETURN

- KAUSHIK DEKA

Nestled in the verdant Naga Hills, the picturesque district of Churachandpur was a tranquil backwater. Today, it is a tragic battleground in the bloody civil war that has engulfed Manipur over the past three months. Dominated by the Kuki tribe, Churachandpur is 60 km from Imphal, capital of the state and home to a majority of the state’s other significant community—the Meiteis. National Highway No. 2, the chief artery connecting the two key districts, has now turned into an unlikely and ugly Line of Control between the two communities. Road after road leading up to the highway, from Meitei areas to Kuki ones, is lined with the burnt remains of deserted homes and torched vehicles. Rifle-toting civilians man the multiple check-posts and bunkers that have come up, to ensure no vehicle from the “enemy zone” enters their territory.

The Meiteis have blocked the movement of civil supplies— even for the armed forces—by road from Imphal to Churachandpur. The Kukis, on the other hand, have ensured that no Meiteis enter their district. On May 3, when ethnic clashes between the two communities broke out across Manipur, more than 6,000 Meiteis in Churachandpur fled the Kuki-dominated district. A State Bank of India ATM in the heart of the district has been nonfunctional for more than two months because its Meitei bank manager, who had access to the codes of the machine, left for the valley below. Likewise, thousands of Kukis vacated their homes in the Meitei-dominated Imphal valley, and headed to the hills inhabited by their tribesmen.