Lessons for the northeast from Manipur

While the continuing ethnic conflict in Manipur since 3 May of this year has received wide media coverage, its short- and long-term implications for the north-east have not received the due importance, even though potential areas of such ethnic conflicts exist in Assam, Tripura and even Meghalaya.

- RANGAN DUTTA

After the reorganisation of Assam and NER in 1971, Manipur emerged as the only state having a large hill area inhabited by assorted groups of Naga and Kuki-Zo people sharing ethno-lingual connection with the Mizos of Mizoram, Chins of Myanmar, and Nagaland; and this makes the Kukis the only transborder tribe inhabiting Myanmar, Bangladesh and India—a fact ignored by the analysts mainly because the consequences of both the separation of Burma from India in 1937 and the later ‘partition in the East’ have not been studied in depth—a point ably made in Shyam Sundar Sharma's well-researched work, The Great Tragic of India's Partition (Manohar 2022). It may be mentioned that Shri Sharma served as the chief secretary of Tripura and is familiar with the ground realities. For instance, the perception that partition in the East only affected the Bengali people is not correct, as it also divided the Bishnupriya Manipuris, Mizos and Kukis, Chakmas, Khasi Jaintias, Garos, Koch Rajbanshis, and tea labour community of Sylhet as well. One must note that Koch Rajbangshis have long been regarded as integral to the composite Assamese language and culture. It is not widely known that Justice S K Sinha, the first Hindu to hold the post of Chief Justice of Bangladesh, was a Manipuri, nor is it known that the area under the autonomous Chakma District Council of Mizoram was always Chakmadominated as it was carved out of Chittagong Hill tracts, which are also the abode of the Kuki tribes. The role of Kuki National Army, an insurgent group active in Chittagong Hill tracts of Bangladesh whose cadres are reportedly coordinating with the activities of Kuki National Organisation in Manipur, suggests the complexity of these transborder security issues.