No takers for Manipur interdistrict bus service in embattled state split into Meitei, Kuki zones

Two white 15-seater Manipur State Transport (MST) buses were parked at a depot in the state capital Imphal on Wednesday morning.

- Thomas Ngangom

Their high-profile trips were highly anticipated.

The windscreens of both were plastered with freshly printed stickers. "ImphalCCPUR", said a sticker on the bus that was to travel to Churachandpur. "Imphal-Senapati," said the other.

By sundown, neither bus had moved an inch, nor found a willing passenger.

The stickers were stripped off, the buses wheeled into their parking bays. A fresh attempt by the Manipur government to resume travel between the two districts, which have been scythed apart by ethnic violence for almost 20 months, had failed a second time, underscoring the unrelenting rift between Kukis and Meiteis.

The administration in the embattled state eventually called off a move it announced continued on only on Tuesday, nearly a year after a similar plan fell through following an equally insipid response.

Churachandpur and Kangpokpi, through which the buses were to pass, are Kuki-Zo-majority districts, and Imphal is a Meitei-dominated one.