Meet pledges to pursue demand for separate administration for hills
Source: The Sangai Express
Kangpokpi, September 07 2015:
Tribal populace of Sadar Hills today pledged to pursue a four-point charter of demands including separate administration for hill people of the State.
Four-point charters of demand were adopted during a public meeting held today at Multipurpose hall, Sadar Hills ADC, Kangpokpi against the backdrop of passing of three Bills by the State Assembly and subsequent protests which claim heavy toll.
To pursue the President of India and Governor of Manipur to reject the passed anti-tribal Bills; termination of the services of those involved in the killing of several protesters at Ccpur and demanding the resignation of tribal particularly Kuki MLAs are among other points included in the four-point charters of demand.
The public meeting, participated by thousands of tribal within Sadar Hills, was organized under the aegis of Kuki Inpi, Sadar Hills.
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Leaders of civil society organizations, social workers, Church leaders, educationists, intellectuals, scholars and UPF leaders attended the meeting amongst others.
The meeting also decided to endorse the decisions taken by tribal apex bodies.
The gatherings also observed one minute silence in respect of the tribal martyrs of Churachandpur while strongly denouncing the alleged brutality of the State security forces.
Several speakers in the meeting strongly condemned the Ibobi's Govt tacit suspension of the GPRS mobile internet service and SMS in the State.
Many CSO leaders lamented that this amounts to curtailing the citizens fundamental rights to freedom of speech and expression while questioning the Ibobi Govt to justify the immediate banning of GPRS mobile internet just a day after some violence in the hills when the entire valley districts were burning with violence for the past 2 months demanding ILPS and no such step was resorted to by the Govt.The speakers asserted that this is nothing but another form of discrimination, stepmotherly treatment towards the hill districts.
They also shared the pain and suffering of the victims who received injuries in the protests.
The meeting also strongly deplored the alleged deliberate and sinister design of the Manipur Government in attempting to forcefully invade the tribal ancestral land.
Condemning the Hill Areas Committee (HAC) members and all the tribal MLAs in the strongest term for allegedly failing to discharge their duty to protect the constitutional provisions guaranteed to tribal people, the meeting also condemned the Manipur Government for undermining the provision under Article 371 (C) of the Indian Constitution.
A Joint Action Committee for Sadar Hills district has also been constituted unanimously with Sehjalien Gangte and Lamtinthang Haokip as the convener and co-convener of the JAC respectively.