India's divisive policy reason for turmoil in Manipur: PREPAK
Source: Chronicle News Service

Imphal, March 24 2024: The proscribed People's Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK) will be observing the 44th Red Army Uprising Day on March 26 .

On the occasion, PREPAK's interim council chairman Aheiba Angom extended revolutionary greetings to all the oppressed and struggling people of Kangleipak (Manipur) and WESEA region.

In his message, Aheiba Angom reminded the people that Kangleipak (Manipur) witnessed two historical catastrophes with the first during the British colonisation in the 19th century and the second being illegal occupation of Kangleipak by the Indian dominion on October 15,1949 till date thereby completely tarnishing the sovereignty and democratic values, civil and political rights of the people of Kangleipak.

In the first instance, Kangleipak resisted the British imperialism to defend her millennia old sovereignty and many Manipuris were martyred while fighting the British force.

In the second instance, India annexed Kangleipak (Manipur) by completely suppressing the political and democratic aspirations of the people in 1949 .

The obnoxious Merger Agreement signed on September 21,1949 by Manipur king under house arrest and psychological and mental torture was in complete violation of the Indian Independence Act, 1947 .

The agreement effective from October 15,1949 was also in violation of the Manipur Constitution Act, 1947, the UN Charter and the existing customary international laws vis-a-vis the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, 1969.The said Manipur Merger Agreement was neither ratified by the then Manipur Assembly (read Parliament) nor appended to in several public meetings held thereafter.

According to Aheiba Angom, before India's annexation of Manipur, all the communities mutually coexisted harmoniously in the vast territory of Manipur with a strong economy as evident from the address of the king Bodhchandra in the maiden Assembly Session on October 18, 1948 .

As per king Bodhchandra's assembly speech, the territory of Manipur extended up to the southern portion of China in the north, the gold mines in the Sibasagar valley, the river of Chindwin in the east and south, and Chandrapore (Cachar) in the west.

The pain for the lease of Kabaw valley to Burma was one reason for the demise of king Bodhchandra and Manipur had a vast territory with self-sufficient economy.

When all the princely states of India had already fallen prey to British colonialism, the unity of Manipur resisted the British imperialism till 1891, Aheiba Angom said adding that now is the time for a united Manipur to work for the political advancement of Manipur.

After 1949, India's divisive policy separated hills and plains that put Manipur into a never ending political turmoil.

India even planted demographic grafting by removing Inner Line Permit System in 1950 thereby allowing free entry, unchecked influx of outsiders from other states and squeezing Kangleipak's territorial boundary.

India has ceaselessly been trying to violate the internationally recognised territorial integrity of Manipur by engineering ethnic cleansing and creation of unknown land within the territory of Manipur.

The political process of India has been so deep rooted that all the communities had been set against one another and made prone to corruption with no feasible peace and security.

It helped the foreign aggressors in their campaign to wipe out Manipur from the globe by using the IB, RAW, SIB besides the different strata of Indian military agencies.

In 1947, the political department of India succeeded in dividing Manipur into two entities, hills and plains.

To continuously threaten to disintegrate Manipur, India made the Akbar Hydari (Nine Point) Agreement of 1947; the 16- Point Agreement of1960 and the Shillong Accord of 1975.Understanding the fact that these bilateral agreements could not violate the territorial integrity of Manipur, the Bangkok Declaration of 2001 was another imperialist design to break up Manipur.

To perpetuate its suppressive rule, India established a parasitic captive market economy for the last 75 years to keep all the Kanglei people under economic bondage instead of shaping an independent strong economy, the chairman said.

Aheiba Angom further said that Indian agents have been exploiting the economy of Manipur to sabotage the democratic rights of the Kanglei people.

Freedom of the media has been gagged and students charged with seditions.

Above this, the notorious AFSPA, 1958 has been clamped giving blanket impunity to the armed forces and sham elections held under bayonets and guns in the name of democracy.

The money power and horse-trading in the Indian elections have only strengthened the Indian occupation of Manipur and turned the beauty of democracy into mirage of the desert without any human values.

Though, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi termed the Indian election as the largest democratic exercise in the world, these elections could not be equated to the referendum for a free Kangleipak or the plebiscite on the national question of Kangleipak.

According to Aheiba Angom, the ruthless uncaring attitude of the government has turned the innocent victims of Chin-Kuki narco-terrorists staying in the relief camps into street beggars without any form of human dignity.

The present conflict has rendered 70,000 people internally displaced, killed 213 innocent lives and 38 people missing including students.

When almost all the revolutionary groups of the WESEA region have been hypnotised into the India's trap of ceasefire agreement or peace talk, the only group that opposed India's sinister designs has been the revolutionary forces of Kangleipak.

This compels India to use every available means to wipe out the revolutionary forces of Kangleipak.

In order to achieve this goal, India manipulated the SoO (Suspension of Operation) with 25 Chin-Kuki- Zo armed groups who never fired a single bullet against the Indian armed forces in 2005 with the Assam Rifles and in 2008 as a tripartite agreement.

Since then, India has been using these SoO groups as mercenaries to launch a full scale proxy war in Manipur to completely eradicate all the revolutionary forces.

India has been providing these SoO groups monthly stipends, arms and ammunition including logistic support and also used them in espionages, Aheiba Angom said in his message.

India could have stopped the ongoing Chin-Kuki-Zo aggression on Kangleipak that has pioneered ethnic cleansing of the Meiteis within minutes if India really wanted to.

This proxy war has been systematically and geopo-litically designed to root out the freedom movement of Manipur on one hand and to combat the Chinese expansion in the WESEA region, for the successful establishment of the Kaladan project and harnessing the natural resources of the WESEA region on the other hand.

According Aheiba Angom, India desperately wants curtailment of the freedom movement of Manipur and accordingly made Manipur the geopolitical war zone in the face of the booming economy of South East Asia and the mounting tension with China.

The recent spurt for border fencing and removal of FMR (Free Movement Regime) has been rolled out to categorize the freedom movement of Manipur as trans-border insurgency and to prevent marching of Chinese army into Manipur in case of a possible future China-India confrontation.

With Arakan Army controlling the major areas of India's multi-billion dollar Kaladan Project in Myanmar, India has built up a rapport between the Kukis of Manipur arid the Chin-Kukis of Myanmar that enabled the Assam Rifles going down to Kaladan.

The recent aggression on Kangleipak is very crucial for Kanglei people as Indian and Myanmarese Kuki groups with sophisticated weapons, facing the onslaught of the Myanmarese Army, have sneaked into Manipur targeting the Meiteis and uprooting the revolutionary forces of Manipur.

For India, it is always a winwin situation like killing two birds with one stone.

With no central security forces protecting them, India must have wondered how the innocent civilians have been facing the Kuki terrorists' bombs and bullets where India stands a silent spectator.

India must not forget how the Meiteis and the co-indigenous people of Kangleipak have risen from the Seven Years Devastation towards gaining freedom from India, the PREPAK interim council chairman said.

Concluding his message, Aheiba Angom said now is the time that a united Manipur (Kangleipak) with a common strength of all the indigenous people in all their respective capabilities should confront the present proxy war.

Ihe most important thing at present is to stop this war which has brought collateral damages on both sides and huge roles of religious leaders, CSOs, senior citizens, youth, students and women leaders are required to bring the war to an end.

As Kangleipak has been a multi-ethnic nation since time immemorial, any arrangement should suit the aspirations of all, Aheiba Angom said.

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