60-hour bandh Manipur hills called on June 24
Source: Hueiyen News Service / Newmai News Network
Imphal, June 20 2011:
A 60-hour bandh in Manipur hill districts has been called from June 24 evening.
Informing this today to Newmai News Network, secretary of Committee on Protection of Tribal Areas Manipur (COPTAM) Thangkam Lupheng said the bandh has been called in protest against the failure of the state government of Manipur to fulfill the "rightful and genuine demands" .
The bandh will begin from 5 pm of June 24 and conclude at 5 am of June 27 .
It may be recalled that on June 4, Committee on Protection of Tribal Areas Manipur (COPTAM) had threatened a drastic agitation if the state government failed to respond positively to its charter of demands by June 19 .
On the issue of Manipur (Hill Areas) District Council, 4th Amendment Act, 2011 COPTAM secretary Thangkam Lupheng said that it has failed to address the core issue of giving legislative, judiciary and financial power to the Autonomous District Council without which the decentralized agency is devoid of true autonomy.
The Proposed Manipur (Village Authority in Hill Areas), 2nd Amendment Act, 2011, poses a direct threat to the existing traditional tribal chieftainship institution and tribal rights over their lands, he added, saying it is premature to abolish the institution without first providing constitutional safeguards.
Thangkam Lupheng said "we need development but not at the cost of our land, custom, culture and tradition" .
He said, "reserved and protected forest declared without the knowledge and consent of the scheduled tribe land owners may be returned to their
rightful owners" .
The COPTAM leader also accused the state government of manipulating census 2011 by way of deletion of tribal population and conducting a overlapping census.
"Double entry was officially permitted by the state government and the overlapping census issue arose which had never been experienced before.
Overlapping of census is done by the state government with the intention to intrude tribal lands tactfully through census," he said.
The imposition of a fixed decadal growth of tribals in Manipur by the state government and subsequent steps taken by district administrations to reduce the population by deleting some people from census records is another facet of the government's anti tribal policy, he added.
"The government should immediately re-enter those deleted persons in the census record so that no one is left out in the current census operation 2011" .
COPTAM has also demanded for the immediate transfer of tribal land records, maintained by their "neighbouring valley districts", to their respective hill districts.
Denouncing the dual administrative authority in the border town Moreh, he said the existence of both municipalities and ADC have led to an overlapping administration.
"This unhealthy practice needs to be discontinued immediately as 80 percent of the people of the area are indigenous tribals who have owned and managed the land according to their customs for ages," Lupheng said.
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