Search Ops begin; 140 weapons surrendered
Source: Chronicle News Service
Imphal, June 02 2023:
As announced by union home minister Amit Shah, search operations were carried out in various areas on Friday.
A combined team of Imphal West district police commando, 12 Grenadier, 167 BSF and Lamphel Police carried out the search oper-ation in Langol Phaipijang, Hebron Veng and Langol Aying Leikai areas from 11 am to 2pm during which 80 houses were searched.
There is, however, no arrest made.
Mention may be made here that the union home min-ister, during his 4-day visit to the state had called for surrendering unauthorised weapons, including arms and ammunition snatched from security forces while cau-tioning of strict legal action against those found possess-ing arms and ammunition.
On the other-hand news agency IANS quoted officials as saying on Friday that af-ter Amit Shah's appeal, 140 weapons, looted earlier from the police and various securi-ty forces, have been surren-dered in different districts.
According to police offi-cials, the surrendered weap-ons included self-loading ri-fles, carbines, AK and 1NSAS rifles, light machine guns, pistols, M16 rifles, smoke/ tear gas guns, sten gun and grenade launchers.
Defence officials said that intelligence informa - tion- based combing oper-ations are underway across Manipur.
"To ensure sustainable peace in Manipur, secu-rity forces have identified de- weaponisation and en-forcement of the provisions of the Suspension of Opera-tion (So0) agreement signed with the Kuki militants as fo-cal points to be addressed im-mediately from the security perspective across Manipur," a defence spokesman said.
He said that intelligence sources have been energised and dedicated columns kept on standby to ensure quick action on receipt of input for early recovery of weapons.
"Surprise checks are being conducted in the designated camps of the Kuki militants under the So0 deal to ensure the availability of weapons and presence of cadres as stipulated in the agreement," the defence PRO said.
He said that the Union Minister asked the Kuki mil-itants to abide by the provi-sions of the agreement by the cadres to maintain peace.
"Pursuant to the Home Min-ister's directions, security forces have evolved detailed plans to launch large scale combing operations for the recovery of snatched weap-ons besides surprise checks of the designated camps Kuki militants, he said.
There are 2,266 Kuki cadres staying in different designated camps after the Centre and the Manipur gov-ernment signed the tripar-tite Suspension of Operation (So0) agreement Kuki Na-tional Army (KNA), Zomi Revolutionary Army (ZRA) and Kuki Revolutionary Army (KRA) -- on August 22, 2008 .
The officials said that cur-rently around 37,450 people of different communities are being sheltered in over 270 relief camps, including com-munity halls in 13 districts.
Manipur had witnessed unprecedented ethnic vi-olence since May 3, leaving at least 80 dead and over 300 injured besides the de-struction and arsoning of around 2,000 houses, huge number of government and private properties and a large number of vehicles.
The violence broke out after a 'Tribal Solidarity March' was organised in 11 hill districts by the All Tribal Students' Union of Manipur to protest the Meitei com-munity's demand for Sched-uled Tribe status.
It was preceded by ten-sion over the eviction of Kuki villagers by the state government from reserve forest land, which had led to a series of smaller agitations in four districts.
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