Eyeing to end insurgency in next 5 years : How is the question
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: September 17, 2022 -

Chief Minister N Biren Singh has reasons to feel upbeat and what better occasion than to spell out that the BJP led Government has plans to end insurgency in Manipur in the next five years during the arms laying down ceremony of 12 cadres of KCP (PWG) and one KYKL cadre.

Must have been a coincidence but surely a happy co-incidence it would have been for the BJP led Government both at New Delhi and Imphal that on the same day that 13 cadres of two outfits surrendered before the Government, a tripartite peace accord was signed with 8 Adivasi militant outfits of Assam at New Delhi in the presence of Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

Peace parleys with the NSCN (IM) back on track, no outstanding issues with the NNPGs, pact with SoO groups still going on strong and parleys underway and others coming on board, laying down arms and surely this is an opportunity the Government cannot afford to lose.

It is in this upbeat climate, that the Chief Minister announced that the Government intends to end insurgency in Manipur in the next five years.

Still early to say how things will progress after the surrender of 13 militants of two outfits, but the interesting question is how the Government intends to 'win over' the other militant outfits which are still active and laying down their agenda.

Till date none of the major outfits active and operating in Manipur, say those under the CorCom and ASUK, have even hinted that they may strike up a political negotiation with the Government of India.

Military might and even imposition of an Act like the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, have not been able to quell the armed movement in Manipur for decades and this would have negated any military approach to resolve the armed movement.

What other options then lies before the Government is the natural question that follows.

It is now more than clear that the peace process with the NSCN (IM) did not take off suddenly but was a process, with feelers being sent as early as 1995 when the late PV Narasimha Rao was the Prime Minister of the country and 'secretly met' leaders of the outfit at Paris with the succeeding Prime Ministers following it up to ultimately lead to the signing of the ceasefire agreement on August 1, 1997, when IK Gujral was the Prime Minister.

The Mizoram Peace Accord of 1986 may have taken a slightly different turn, as it was the Church which played a major role to convince the then supremo of the Mizo National Front, Laldenga to lay down arms and talk things over the table but it did bring to an end the armed movement led by the Mizo National Front back then.

Citing two examples from two neighbouring States to stress the point that all peace process should have a starting point and there is no reason to believe that Manipur will not need one such starting point.

And obviously it will need for the Government to study and explore from where any process to resolve the armed movement must start.

Tough to say how things will develop in the coming years but in the meantime it is important for the Government to acknowledge that for too long Manipur and the other North East States have existed in the consciousness of Delhi as peripheral States.

The chicken neck syndrome is real, very real and one just has the recollect how people from the North East region came under the tag 'corona' when the COVID-19 pandemic broke out in 2020.

It is this 'peripheral' mentality that the Government at New Delhi and Imphal must try to address on a priority basis.