Tribal leaders demand immediate resignation of HAC members
Source: Hueiyen News Service / K Kopham Kanshouwa

Imphal, September 05 2015 : Several tribal bodies in Manipur on Saturday demanded the resignation Hill Areas Committee (HAC) members at a one-day consultative meeting on the current political turmoil in the hills.

The meeting organized by All Tribal Chiefs' Forum, Manipur (ATCFM) was held at Tribal Research Institute (TRI) Auditorium, Imphal.

ATCFM Advisors, former MP and MLA BD Behring; IRS (Retired) Tongmang Haokip; Amu Kamei and Dr Vareiso Ningshen attended the meeting as the main speakers.

Behring while pointing out that the three Bills passed recently by the Manipur Assembly "directly infringed" on tribal interests, said that the State Government had also by-passed the HAC in the process.

With reference to The Protection of Manipur People Bill, 2015 and its extension to the "whole of the State of Manipur", Behring stated that any matter related to the hills has to be referred to HAC except money Bills as per the rules and provision of business of Manipur Legislative Assembly.

Other tribal leaders and those who attended the meeting demanded the immediate resignation of HAC members from their posts as they have been accused of not raising objections and also for betraying the tribal communities.

The leaders also decided to forward a memorandum to the President of India, Prime Minister and the Governor of Manipur so as to apprise them of the resolutions adopted at the meeting.

The meeting felt that the problem of "non-local residents" will equally affect the hill areas and the State Government should have mentioned clearly that a separate provision for hill areas will be made.

The Government has committed a grave mistake by not consulting the tribal leaders, tribal societies and tribal student unions in such important matter, said the leaders during the meeting.

Meanwhile, the consultative meeting endorsed any form of agitation launched by the Joint Action Committee (JAC) against the killing of eight persons in Churachandpur protest.

Comment