UPM urges
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, October 17 2026: The United Peoples of Manipur (UPM) has urged the Government to constitute specialised search teams comprising CRPF, Assam Rifles, State Police Special Investigation Team and Forensic experts to trace people who have gone missing amid the Manipur conflict.

While official records reflect 49 untraced individuals across all communities, civil societies tracking the cases have verified at least 31 to 32 Meitei persons including minors whose whereabouts remain unresolved, said the UPM in a statement.

While the physical remains of Ngangom Nevy Meitei (17-18) were recovered in January 2024 from Sokom village, Chandel district, the whereabouts of high school students Phijam Hemanjit and Hijam Linthoingambi, Atom Samarendra and Yumkhaibam Kirankumar and many others remain unknown till today, it said.

The State's failure to retrieve bodies of missing persons who are presumed to be dead from known conflict corridors has severely degraded public trust in the rule of law, it added.

The Government of Manipur and the Union Ministry of Home Affairs must constitute specialized search teams comprising CRPF, Assam Rifles, State police Special Investigation Team (SlT), and forensic experts with unrestricted cross de-facto ethnic partition authority to search suspected burial sites in peripheral hill/foothill zones, it said.

Closure cannot be achieved through financial grants.

The families of the missing deserve to know the truth about their loved ones.

"We demand action, accountability, and the immediate recovery of physical remains," it added.

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