On June 7, Ngurthansang fled his home in Manipur’s Jiribam district as violence spread in an area that had been relatively safe from the ethnic clashes in the rest of the state for more than a year.
With about eighty Hmar families, Ngurthansang moved to Lakhipur in neighboring Assam, across the Jiri River. The 33-year-old spent four months in a relief camp in Hmarkhawlien, a Hmar village in Lakhipur, with his wife and three children.
In October, as peace slowly returned to Jiribam and the school where his wife worked reopened, the family returned to their home in Zairawn, a village in Hmar. “It was peaceful, but all the villagers stayed together at night and a few men from the village guarded us,” Ngurthansang said. Role.
However, on November 7, the village was attacked, reportedly by members of the Meitei armed group Arambai Tenggol. Ngurthansang’s wife, a 31-year-old teacher, was tortured, raped and burned.
The attack on Zairawn marked the beginning of a new cycle of violence in which women and children were ruthlessly targeted.
Four days later, a group of armed Hmar men attacked a relief camp in the district and abducted six women and children – one an eight-month-old baby – from the same Meitei family. Their bodies were recovered a few days later from the rivers at Jiribam.
Ten of the attackers were killed in retaliatory fire when they reportedly attacked a Central Reserve Police Force post near the relief camp in Borbekra.
Security officials said Role that the attack on the Meitei settlement was ‘revenge’ for the death of the Hmar woman in Zairawn.
They also described the first attack on the village of Hmar as “unprovoked” and “surprising” – and aimed at disrupting the fragile peace of recent weeks.
“Why did they kill the Hmar woman without any instigation?” said a senior Meitei police official, who was part of the efforts to defuse communal hostility. “Because the Arambai Tenggol wanted to send a message. To disrupt the peace, they targeted Zairawn.”
The Arambai Tenggol is a vigilante group of Meitei, whose cadres exist so-called have carried out brutal attacks on the Kuki-Zo community during the ethnic conflict in the state, and are said to have close links with Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh.
The long-running conflict in Manipur between the Meiteis majority and the Kuki-Zomi-Hmar minority tribes has resulted in 255 deaths and the displacement of 60,000 people.
A cluster of armed men
According to the senior police official, the Arambai Tenggol in Jiribam has grown in strength since violence broke out in June, with many cadres arriving in the district from Imphal Valley to defend Meiteis.
An Assam Rifles official stationed in Jiribam said this Role that armed outsiders from both communities have filtered into the district for reinforcement. “Since the violence in June, there has been a build-up of armed men from Imphal Valley and Churachandpur,” the official said.
Of the ten Hmar men killed on November 11 during an attack on a settlement in Meitei, none were from Jiribam. Seven men had come to the district from Churachandpur, while three men had arrived from Pherzawl, the district bordering Jiribam.
Security officials and community leaders pointed to a worrying militarization of both communities in Jiribam.
A political leader, who does not belong to either community, said: “The number of young people taking up arms on both sides has increased significantly – mainly under the influence of outsiders.”
A silence that didn’t last
Jiribam is a small district home to many communities, from Muslim and Hindu Bengalis to Meiteis, Pangals and Kuki-Zomi and Naga tribes.
In May last year, as ethnic conflict spread from Churachandpur to Imphal, a peace committee comprising people from different communities, security forces and district authorities kept violence at bay here for almost thirteen months. However, in June, the murder of a Meitei man broke the peace, leading to an exodus from both communities.
Despite the setback, the Jiribam Peace Committee persuaded the representatives of the Meitei and Hmar communities to return to the discussion table. They met twice in Cachar and on August 1 an agreement was signed to restore normalcy and “prevent incidents of arson and shooting”.
“We believed that some Meiteis also wanted peace,” said an Hmar leader who was part of the peace committee.
The senior Meitei police official said the foundation had been laid for a third round of talks between Hmars and Meiteis in Guwahati.
However, not everyone wanted the violence to end. “The Meiteis are a house divided,” the senior Meitei police official said. “One section wanted to derail the process of gaining political milestones. And thus the attack on the village of Hmar. It is a pity that the Jiribam people allowed themselves to be influenced by outside influences.”
This was said by a Meitei leader who was part of the peace committee Role that after the June violence, several residents of Jiribam joined the Arambai Temggol “as they are for our protection and defense.”
The central security officer said this Role that “the number of weapons reaching Arambai Tenggol cadres had increased in recent months.”
Although most of Jiribam appeared peaceful, Kuki-Zos and Meiteis were often caught in crossfire in two villages on the outskirts of Jiribam city.
‘Help’ from the hills
As the violence simmered, reinforcements for the Kuki-Zomi-Hmar tribes – from Churachandpur and Pherzawl – also arrived.
“Jiriribam is our area, but we have fewer resources and people there,” said a Hmar leader from Churachandpur. “So to prevent the enemy from invading our areas, the armed village volunteers should go there.”
The festering ethnic conflict in Manipur has prompted civilians from the warring communities to take up arms to guard their villages. They are often described as ‘village volunteers’.
Twenty-two-year-old Lalthanei Hmar was one such armed citizen.
Before taking up arms last year, Lalthanei Hmar worked as a daily wage painter in the city of Churachandpur.
Two weeks ago he made his way to Jiribam – a day’s journey, involving two vehicles and a river crossing.
“Our villages in Jiribam were attacked. So the volunteer committee here selected two to three men from each village and sent them to Jiribam to guard the villages,” said R Hmar, his cousin who lives in Churachandpur.
Lalthanei Hmar was reportedly among the group of armed men who attacked the Borobekra relief camp on November 11.
Borobekra is a sparsely populated area and is surrounded by Bengali and Hmar villages. More than a hundred Meiteis, displaced during the June violence, had sought shelter in the relief camp. Security officials said Role that this was an area where the Meiteis were “vulnerable” and “easy targets”.
To repel the attack, CRPF personnel opened fire on the attackers, who, according to several eyewitnesses, set fire to shops and houses and opened fire at a CRPF post in the area.
Lalthanei Hmar was one of 10 armed men killed in the shooting.
However, Kuki-Zo-Hmar groups dispute this version and have criticized the CRPF for shooting the men. They also alleged that the armed Meiteis and the perpetrators of the violence in Zairawn village were hiding in the camp – a claim denied by the Assam Rifles.
One measure of the deep divide between the ethnic communities is that several Hmar people defended the attackers’ actions – even the violence against unarmed civilians – arguing that “the presence of Meiteis is a threat to the lives of the Hmars.”
“The village volunteers did what they had to do in a civil war or an ethnic conflict,” said a resident of Hmar Role. “And so they attacked the remaining Meiteis in that area.”
‘A cycle of violence and counter-violence’
Security officials and police officers said this Role that restoring peace to the area is now an almost impossible task.
One of the reasons is that both communities have decided to arm themselves.
“Each person is either a village volunteer or a member of the Arambai Tenngol or the UNLF (United National Liberation Frontan armed separatist Meitei group),” the central security official said. “Most of them are armed. Or they are informants.”
The official added: “The mentality has been limited to the cycle of violence and counter-violence. The young men cannot think further than that.”
The political leader, who does not belong to the Meitei or Kuki-Zo groups, added: “The young men have stopped studying and taken up arms in the name of protecting their motherland.”
The senior Meitei police official pointed out that “prolonged violence” over 18 months was to blame for Jiribam’s spiral of clashes. “If you think it will improve automatically, you are wrong.”
He said he was not optimistic about the return of peace. “Jiriribam was once the hope, but now it is the epicenter of violence.”
All photos by Rokibuz Zaman.
