Obstacles on the road to peace
- The People's Chronicle Editorial :: October 23, 2023 -

WHEN farmers needed security cover not only at the time of ploughing and sowing paddy seeds in their agricultural lands, but also for harvesting their crops now, then the claim of Chief Minister N Biren Singh that Manipur has achieved 90 percent peace, as if it is something that could be measured or quantified, sounds ridiculous, to say the least.

When the state security personnel sent from Imphal as reinforcement for aid in maintaining law and order have been blocked from entering the border town of Moreh, the assurance of the Chief Minister that there would be total peace in the state soon, appears to be nothing but a wishful thinking.

Of course, there have been no sound of gun firing and attacks by the Kuki militants at the Meitei villages in peripheral areas bordering the hill districts in the last two-three weeks or so, and there has been a semblance of peace and normalcy returning in the state, but the air of uncertainty enveloping the strife-torn state is so thick that the people are keeping their fingers crossed.

The violent conflict that broke out between the Meiteis/Metei and Kuki-Chin communities oh May 3 last is going to complete six months with no sign of any solution in sight.

Apart from hundreds of precious human lives that have been lost and thousands of families rendered homeless, forcing them to seek shelter in relief camps set up across the length and breadth of the state; the whereabouts of a dozen of people who have gone missing during the conflict are yet to be traced.

With leaders of the two warring communities not showing any sign of willingness to sit across the table for talks and the state administration still groping in the dark and doing nothing concrete to bring lasting solution other than giving half-hearted assurances every now then, the road to peace in Manipur is still fraught with danger and uncertainty.

Amidst this uncertainty, a report on Kuki militants setting up multiple bunkers by digging trenches on the western side of Naransena and its adjacent villages along the Thangjing Hill range has surfaced.

The report is based on drone footage, which shows Kuki militants expanding their bunkers along the hill range from where they used to launch armed attacks on Meitei villages during the height of the current conflict.

The latest drone-footage has shown that location of some of the new bunkers constructed by Kuki militants are just about 200 to 800 metres away from Moirang High Canal of the Loktak Lift Irrigation Project.

What is even more disturbing in the report is that these trenches are being dug up with use of heavy machineries and new bunkers are coming up even in area close to camps of central security forces.

We need to remember that agricultural lands from Moirang High Canal to the foothills of Thangjing, which are owned by Meiteis and Meitei Pangals, came under the domination of Kuki militants who even started agricultural activities until BSF personnel chased them away and set up their camps in early part of july.

While this disturbing development has raised questions on the repeated claims made by the state administration and its security apparatus that all the unauthorised bunkers both in the hills and the valley have been dismantled and law and order situation brought under control, apprehension of the public that the Kuki militants might launch fresh offensive not only to disrupt farmers from harvesting paddy but also to sabotage the government's plan of destroying poppy cultivation in the hill areas before it could be harvested in December seems to have been validated.

So, it's no time for the government to give half-hearted assurances that are not going to convince anyone but to put its act together and show its worthiness by removing all the obstacles on the road to peace.