The Kuki people have reached a decisive moment after more than three years of bloodshed, displacement and total breakdown of trust with the state of Manipur. What the Centre is now trying to sell as a peace plan is in reality a forced peace package without justice, without security and without any political future for the Kuki people. The plan is to push a few Kuki MLAs to attend the Manipur Legislative Assembly, offer a symbolic Deputy Chief Minister post to Mrs. Nemcha Kipgen, declare that normalcy has returned, and bury the core demand of Separate Administration. This plan has been outrightly rejected by the Kuki people on the ground, from the relief camps of Songpi and Kangpokpi to the villages of Saikul, Tengnoupal and the hills. We did not survive three years of state-sponsored ethnic cleansing to settle for a Deputy CM chair. We survived to secure a future where we will never again have to run for our lives from Imphal.
The first question every Kuki is asking is, what kind of peace is the Centre talking about? For more than three years, since May 3, 2023, the Kuki people have been systematically hunted, killed and displaced from Imphal valley and its peripheries. More than 250 innocent Kuki people have been killed by Meitei mobs, many in the most barbaric manner. Our people were burnt alive inside their homes and ambulances, including women and children. Our people were beheaded and their bodies mutilated. Our women were paraded naked in the streets of B. Phainom by Meitei mobs and gang-raped, an incident that shamed India before the whole world. Meitei mobs looted armories, burnt more than 7,000 Kuki houses, destroyed more than 360 Kuki churches, and reduced properties worth more than Rs. 4,000 crore belonging to Kuki people to ashes. More than 40,000 Kuki people are still living in relief camps, unable to return home. In this reality, where a Kuki cannot even enter Imphal to buy medicine or catch a flight, where is the peace? Peace cannot be declared by Delhi. Peace has to be felt on the ground. Forced peace without addressing these crimes is not peace. It is suppression, and it has shamed the whole of India.
The offer of a Deputy Chief Minister post and ministerial posts to Kuki MLAs is being seen by the Kuki people as the biggest insult added to this three-year injury. What will a Kuki Deputy CM do in a Cabinet led by those who justified violence against her own people? What power will she have when her own people cannot enter the Secretariat in Imphal? Will she be able to bring back the dead? Will she be able to rebuild the churches that were burnt? Will she be able to provide justice to the women who were paraded naked? A Deputy CM post without Separate Administration is a lollipop. It is a token post with no authority over police, no authority over land, and no authority over security. The Kuki people did not sacrifice more than 250 lives and properties worth more than Rs. 4,000 crore for a post. If the Centre thinks that giving Mrs. Nemcha Kipgen a car with a beacon and a bungalow in Imphal will make the Kuki people forget the beheading and burning alive of their loved ones, it is grossly mistaken. We want a political solution for our people, not a post for a politician.
Even more dangerous is the pressure being built on Kuki MLAs to attend the Manipur Assembly session. The Centre and the Manipur Government want to show the world that Manipur is united because Kuki MLAs have come to Imphal. But the ground reality is completely different. Since the violence began, Manipur has been physically and administratively divided into two. This was proved by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, Home Minister Amit Shah, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi visiting the ground. There is total separation. No Kuki can go to Imphal and no Meitei comes to the Kuki-dominated hill areas. Buffer zones guarded by central forces separate us. In such a situation, forcing or offering money to Kuki MLAs to attend the Assembly in Imphal is not a solution. It is a betrayal of the Kuki victims. Their mandate is not to legitimize the same Assembly that remained silent when Kuki people were burnt alive and beheaded. Their mandate is to fight for Separate Administration. If they attend the Assembly without Separate Administration, they will be seen as having abandoned the martyrs and the 40,000 displaced people in relief camps.
KHRC Condemns Participation of 3 Kuki MLAs in Manipur Assembly, Says Deputy CM Post Not Recognized
This entire exercise of offering a Deputy CM post to Mrs. Nemcha Kipgen and forcing Assembly attendance is part of a well-planned divide and rule policy by the Centre BJP Government. The Central Government knows very well that the Kuki people are united like never before on one single demand, which is Separate Administration in the form of Union Territory with Legislature under Article 239A of the Constitution. This unity is a problem for those who want to maintain Meitei dominance over the entire state. So the strategy is to divide the Kuki leadership. The method is simple. Approach a few leaders, offer them posts, promise them security and funds, and create a split. This is an old colonial tactic that has been used against tribals across India for decades. Give a small post to one leader and take away the rights of the entire community. The Kuki people have understood this game. We have seen in the past how such token accommodations never translated into security for the common Kuki villager. Today, the Kuki people are more politically aware than ever. We know that our fight is not for a chair in Imphal. Our fight is for our land, our identity, and our future generation.
Another reason why forced peace without Separate Administration will never work is because the root cause of the conflict has not been addressed. The root cause is not a misunderstanding between two communities. The root cause is the majoritarian and supremacist policy of the Manipur Government that wanted to grab Kuki ancestral lands, that branded Kuki as foreigners in their own land, that initiated reserved forest and eviction drives only against Kuki villages, and that allowed radical groups to openly give a call for genocide against Kuki people. For three years, the state machinery failed to protect Kuki lives. In many cases, state forces were seen standing with the mobs that were burning Kuki houses. How can we go back to the same administration? How can we trust the same police and the same bureaucracy that watched our women being paraded naked? Trust once broken by blood cannot be rebuilt by a Deputy CM post. It can only be rebuilt by a new political arrangement where Kuki people can govern themselves, secure their own land, and live with dignity. That arrangement is Separate Administration.
The Centre must also realize that the Kuki people are not asking for something unconstitutional. We are not asking for secession. We are Indian citizens and we want to remain within India, but with a separate administration that guarantees our safety. We are asking for Union Territory with Legislature, which is very much within the Constitution of India, just like Puducherry and earlier Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir. This is the only practical solution because separation has already happened on the ground. Administration has already been separated. Kuki people cannot go to Imphal for education, health, or any government work. Meitei people cannot come to Lamka or Kangpokpi. The two communities have been living separately for more than three years. The only sensible thing is to give a legal and constitutional shape to this separation through Separate Administration. Trying to forcefully merge them again under the same Imphal administration through a Deputy CM post to Mrs. Nemcha Kipgen will only lead to another round of violence, not peace.
Therefore, the message from the Kuki people is loud, clear, and unanimous. We reject the Centre’s plan for forced peace without Separate Administration. We reject the Deputy CM post offered to Mrs. Nemcha Kipgen as a bribe for our blood. We reject the move to make Kuki MLAs attend the Manipur Assembly and legitimize an Assembly that presided over the killing of more than 250 Kuki people, the naked parade of our daughters, the burning alive of our elders, and the destruction of properties worth more than Rs. 4,000 crore. We have endured more than three years of suffering. We have buried our martyrs. We have lived in relief camps. And we have kept our demand peaceful and democratic. We will not compromise on Separate Administration. There can be no peace, no return to normalcy, and no political process without Separate Administration. The Government of India must listen to the voice of the people on the ground, not to a few political brokers in Delhi and Imphal.
