Meitei women group frees 11 militants detained by Army, KWOHR condemns

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaMay 1, 2024

The Kuki Women Organisation for Human Rights (KWOHR) is aghast at the obsequious acts of the so-called Meirapaibis on May 30 in ‘snatching’ off 11 Meitei armed miscreants namely, the Arambai Tenggol and the VBIGs from the Mahar Regiment.

According to the report, an army convoy that was ferrying 11 members of Arambai Tenggol was stopped near Imphal by a large group of women protesters, who managed to free the nabbed men from the army’s custody.

Even Manipur Police confirmed that the army’s Mahar Regiment had caught 11 “armed miscreants dressed in police fatigues” and were returning after the operation when the women protesters freed the 11 men. The army had recovered three AK series rifles, five INSAS, two SLRs, two hand grenades and bulletproof jackets from the armed men.

The women protesters parked vehicles on the road to block the convoy. Later, they also came onto the road and refused to let the convoy pass through. There were men behind the women. It was a planned blockade in Kumbi. But the army column managed to keep the weapons safe. The weapons could not be snatched,

Reacting sharply to the incident, KWOHR general secretary Kimneihoi Lhungdim said: “What is more astonishing is how a convoy of the centrally-deployed Mahar Regiment simply succumbed to the pressures of the pseudo-right activists Meirapaibis in letting off those Meitei terrorists, whose sole purpose and goal lies in ‘annihilation of the Kuki-Zo’ community, and secession from the Indian Union.”

“As such, the KWOHR strongly decries the prejudicial acts of the central security forces (Mahar Regt) by compromising the military code of conduct, procedures and principles much to the detriment of the minority Kuki-Zo community,” she said.

“It is prudent on the part of the MHA to give clear-cut justification (s) as to why the 11 Meitei terrorists with proven evidence were released without restraint while a considerable number of detained Kuki-Zo (without evidence) are still languishing in jails. It may be recalled that in every attack on Kuki-Zo villages by the Meiteis, the Meirapaibis block/obstruct Army convoys from entering Kuki-Zo inhabited areas,” she also said.

“If any Kuki-Zo individual is arrested in the future, the KWOHR shall not remain mute spectators any longer rather; it shall exert any available means and resources to counter such acts of double standards by the security agencies,” she further said.

The KWOHR implored the Central government to rein in the Meirapaibis, the ‘dramatic’ existence of which only exacerbates violence in the state, as it calls for revocation of the AFSPA (1958) in the hill areas if the same is not to be re-invoked in the Imphal valley.