From Lansan to Leilon, a pattern of attacks on farmers in their fields is reopening old wounds; accountability and neutral protection are now urgent
By Sasang Haokip
There is no military honour in shooting a farmer. There is no cause, however grand its rhetoric of liberation or homeland, that is advanced by opening fire on men and women bent over paddy fields with nothing in their hands but sickles and seed. Yet this is precisely what has been unfolding in the hills of Manipur, where a disturbing pattern of armed attacks on unarmed Kuki villagers — attacks that community organizations have repeatedly attributed to the NSCN-IM and its alleged proxies — has left families bereaved, villages terrorized, and an already fragile region bracing for worse.
A Pattern Written in Blood
Consider the recent record. In June 2026, Haogin Louvum, a 55-year-old farmer from Lansan Kuki village in Tamenglong district, was working a paddy field alongside fellow villagers when gunmen opened fire, killing him. He was not a combatant. He was not armed. He was growing food. The Kuki Inpi Sadar Hills alleged the attack was carried out by cadres linked to the NSCN-IM’s Kamson group, even as police investigations continue.
Weeks earlier, in Noney district, Nohjang Haokip of Joujangtek village sustained bullet injuries when, according to a joint statement by civil society organizations of the Leimata area, NSCN-IM militants fired on villagers walking to their farms. The CSOs were unambiguous: he was unarmed and engaged only in his daily livelihood.
Then came Leilon Vaiphei in Kangpokpi district, where the Kuki Organisation for Human Rights Trust described a coordinated four-hour assault beginning at dawn on June 15, leaving three youths seriously wounded. KOHUR called it a premeditated act of terror against unarmed civilians and accused the NSCN-IM and the Zeliangrong United Front-Kamson of orchestrating it — and alleged, more disturbingly, that attempts were made to obstruct the wounded from receiving medical treatment in Imphal.
Why “Cowardly” Is the Right Word
Armed groups that claim to fight for a people’s dignity reveal their true character in whom they choose to point their guns at. An insurgency that engages security forces takes a risk; a militia that fires on farmers in their fields takes none. The victims here could not shoot back. Targeting them is not warfare. It is intimidation of the weakest, calculated to empty the hills of a community through fear.
This is not a new tactic. The scars of the 1990s Kuki-Naga conflict remain raw: the massacre of around 115 Kuki civilians in September 1993 — remembered as the Joupi massacre — and a decade in which hundreds died, thousands of homes were burned, and tens of thousands were displaced. When today’s farmers are shot, Kuki villagers experience it as the reopening of an old wound.
What Must Happen
First, accountability. Kuki organizations have demanded time-bound, independent investigations, including into alleged inaction of nearby security posts. Allegations must be tested, perpetrators identified, and prosecutions pursued.
Second, protection. The Indian state has a constitutional obligation under Article 21 to protect lives. Farmers in Tamenglong, Noney, and Kangpokpi are citizens no less than anyone in Imphal or Delhi. Vulnerable villages along fault lines need credible, neutral security.
Third, restraint and honesty. It must be said plainly: the NSCN-IM has not responded to these specific allegations, and police attribution remains pending in several cases. The history also includes violence by Kuki armed groups against Naga civilians, and any honest reckoning must condemn atrocities regardless of flag. Naga civilians too deserve safety.
But none of that softens the central truth: whoever fires on unarmed farmers has abandoned any claim to be fighting for a people. They are fighting against people — the most defenceless there are.
