MPP denounces Rijiju's statements
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, August 03 2018: MPP has strongly objected Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju's statement that there is no boundary dispute between India and Myanmar.

Speaking to media persons at their Mapal Kangjeibung office this afternoon, MPP president Oinam Jugindro remarked that Kiren Rijiju's statement given in the Rajya Sabha on August 1 smacked of sheer irresponsibility.

A joint team of the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of External Affairs, Survey of India and Land Port Authority of India visited Kwatha Khunou and inspected the Indo-Myanmar boundary on July 25.Apart from coming without any equipment or tools, the team maintained that there is no border dispute.

Subsequently, the local villagers, CSO leaders and representatives of political parties took the Central team to the spot where BP 81 stood earlier even though they were quite reluctant.

Thus they saw the reality, Jugindro said.

They went back saying that they would inform the State Government for resurvey of the Indo-Myanmar boundary after one month.

Notwithstanding these facts, MoS (Home) Kiren Rijiju had the audacity to say that there is no border dispute between India and Myanmar, Jugindro decried.

In case the Central Government and the State Government stubbornly refuse to re-survey the Indo-Myanmar boundary, particularly the Manipur sector, MPP will launch a civil movement demanding the exact territory of Manipur which was there before the State's merger with the Indian Union, said the MPP president.

On the inaugural session of the first Manipur State Assembly held on October 18, 1948, Maharaj Bodhchandra gave a brief account of the territory of Manipur.

"She (Manipur) had her dominion over a wide area extending as far as the southern portion of China in the North, the gold mines in the Sibsagar Valley, the Chindwin River in the East and South and Cachar Valley in the West", Jugindro said quoting the king.

Many people have been asking why all these areas should not be taken as parts of Manipur when it was merged with the Indian Union on October 15, 1949 .

The collective psyche is still haunted by one particular historical incident when Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru gifted away Manipur's Kabaw Valley to Burma in 1953.If the loss of Manipur's territory piece by piece is a gift of the merger with the Indian Union, there is no harm in demanding Manipur's pre-merger status, Jugindro asserted.

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