Third visit of Rahul
- The People's Chronicle Editorial :: July 09, 2024 -

THERE could be nothing more telling than this.

At a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi is busy visiting foreign countries, Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi came to Manipur for the third time on July 8.

Despite being the executive head of the government in the country, Narendra Modi has so far no time to spare from his busy schedule of election campaigning for his party, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and making foreign trips to pay a visit to Manipur, which has been roiled by an unprecedented ethnic conflict that broke out on May 3 last year after people of Kuki-Chin community clashed with the Meetei/Meitei over the latter's demand for recognition as scheduled tribe (ST) under the Constitution of India.

Apart from loss of hundreds of precious human lives and rendering homeless thousands of families on both sides of the clash divide, forcing them to seek refuge in relief camps; the more than 14-month long ethnic conflict has caused untold suffering to people of all communities living in this tiny multi-ethnic state, regardless of their stance of neutrality from siding with any of the warring groups.

Yet, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has thought it not important to visit the strife-torn state and meet its people.

This is despite him having come to the neighbouring state of Assam twice during one of which he went for enjoying a safari ride at the Kaziranga National Park.

We are not saying nor alluding in any way that the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Manipur would have made any difference then nor now.

But as the executive head of the government, it would have been more than befitting and proper for the Prime Minister to pay a visit at least once to the violence-hit Manipur, which is an essential part of his country, without being egged on by anyone.

It is this failure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to visit the violence-hit Manipur till date that has come to the fore in stark contrast when leader of the Indian National Congress (INC) and MP Rahul Gandhi landed in Manipur on July 8 for the third time.

After the ethnic violence erupted on May 3 last year, Rahul Gandhi visited Manipur for the first time on June 30 and stayed for two days meeting the violence-affected people.

For the second time, he came to Manipur on January 14 this year for launching his Bharat Jodo Nyaya Yatra from Thoubal district.

Of course, all these visits had taken place ahead of the 18th Lok Sabha election and the reasons were obvious.

But after the election and becoming Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi returned to the state for the third time. So, this visit is more significant than any of his earlier visits for various reasons.

The third visit of Rahul Gandhi to Manipur has come at a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi is currently on a tour of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Austria from July 8 to 10.

So, this visit has succeeded in accentuating the failure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to take time off from his foreign visits to pay attention on what is going on in his own country.

But most importantly, the visit has come just five days after the Prime Minister broke his silence on the Manipur violence and spoke about it in the Rajya Sabha on July 3 during which he claimed that violence is continuously declining and efforts are being made to ensure return of peace and complete normalcy.

So, the third visit of Rahul Gandhi may have been planned to personally assess whether violence has indeed declined as claimed by the Prime Minister but strongly contested by the people.

But the fact that situation on the ground is far from getting back to normalcy has been proved beyond an iota of doubt when suspected armed Kuki militants opened fire at an armoured vehicle of the security forces in Jiribam, just hours before Rahul Gandhi arrived in the district bordering Assam to meet internally displaced people living in relief camps.