The Kangla meeting
- The People's Chronicle Editorial :: January 25, 2024 -

WHATEVER it might be and the justification that could be given, the heavy security arrangement witnessed in and around Imphal, the capital city of the strife-tom Manipur, since a day before a meeting convened by Arambai Tenggol with all the elected legislators from Meitei/Meetei community was scheduled to take place at the historic Kangla Fort on January 24, was something unprecedented.

The images and video clips of the heavy security bandobast captured secretly by some concerned people on their mobile phones from moving vehicles and shared on various social media platforms may have sent chills down the spine of any onlooker.

With armoured vehicles lining up along all the roads leading to the Kangla Fort and heavily armed security personnel positioning themselves everywhere, it was like re-enactment of a scene straight out of a blockbuster Hollywood action movie, portending of a calamitous event that was about to unfold.

After seeing that, one singular nagging question that arose in the mind of people was would the violent conflict between the Meitei/Meetei and Kuki-Chin communities that broke out from Churachandpur district on May 3 last year continue till this day if similar stringent security arrangement had been put in place in the peripheries and foothill areas of the state, where the violent confrontations persist.

This may be just a suppositional question that would never give a definite answer that would satisfy anyone.

However, when everything that is happening in Manipur for the last several months is so confusing, even to the extent of becoming inexplicable, and the elected representatives seem to have abandoned their responsibilities of protecting the lives and properties of the people who elected them in the first place, such suppositional questions are the only option left for the hapless people in Manipur in their desperate attempts of trying to make sense of anything and everything.

It is against this backdrop, the significance and relevance of the invitation sent out by Arambai Tenggol to all the elected legislators from Meitei/Meetei community, including Members of Parliament, Ministers and MLAs; for a joint meeting at the historic Kangla Fort on January 24 should be seen and understood.

Contrary to what the leaders of Kuki-Chin people have been saying and the same being quoted verbatim by some mainstream media outlets, Arambai Tenggol was floated as a youth-based socio-cultural platform with a vision to protect and promote the culture and tradition of the Meitei/Meetei.

Before the outbreak of current violent conflict between the Meitei/Meetei and Kuki-Chin communities, not many people within the Meitei/Meetei community itself knew about the existence of Arambai Tenggol and its founder members may have never thought even in their wildest dream that they would one day take up arms against the aggression of Kuki-Chin militants for protecting the unity and integrity of Manipur as a geopolitical entity.

But today, members of Arambai Tenggol, which have grown exponentially after the conflict broke out, are in the frontlines to protect the vulnerable villagers living in the peripheries and foothill areas of the state from the frequent armed attacks of Kuki militants, which essentially should be the task and responsibility of the elected representatives.

This has led to a situation where Arambai Tenggol has come to be feared most by Kuki-Chin people, who called it "radical Meitei/Meetei group or militia" while gaining increasing support from the Meitei/Meetei people, who have now realised that they could expect nothing from their elected representatives, the whereabouts of some of whom remained unknown until summoned for a meeting at the historic Kangla Fort.

This meeting, in no way, should be interpreted as surrendering of a democratically and constitutionally elected government and its legislators to the diktat of a group of radical youths but awakening the elected representatives from their deep slumber and pricking their conscience.

Afterall, desperate times call for desperate measures, doesn't it?.