New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s comes more than two years after violence ripped through the border state in May 2023.
The BJP wants this fleeting appearance to be seen as a gesture of concern, but the record is clear. Lok Sabha leader of opposition Rahul Gandhi was on the ground within weeks, visiting relief camps and meeting victims. Modi, by contrast, remained silent for months as the state burned, making no attempt to visit or even acknowledge the spiralling emergency.
Voters noticed, when in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP was routed in Manipur, losing both seats to the Congress. The defeat was resounding and left no room for spin or excuses.
Modi’s aloofness stands in stark hypocrisy with his high-minded pronouncements of 2017, when he
in Manipur that “those who cannot ensure peace in the state have no right to govern”. These words now sound hollow, as his government’s deliberate inaction has allowed the crisis to metastasise, with the prime minister only emerging from self-imposed exile once it became politically inescapable. His belated visit to the divided state only underscores the unresolved questions that continue to plague Manipur.
- Unreturned weapons to state armouries
The problem of weapons taken from state armouries in the state capital by majoritarian militia groups at the onset of violence remains unresolved. More than 6,000 sophisticated weapons, from AK-47s to mortars, were plundered in May 2023. Despite loud assurances, much of these arms have not been recovered, and they now fuel an entrenched culture of violence that undermines the authority of the Indian state.
The Modi government’s failure to restore state control over its weaponry ensures any meaningful peace remains a mirage.
- Justice for victims of majoritarian violence
Victims, especially among the Kuki-Zo communities, see justice as an empty slogan. Few convictions have emerged, even with video evidence of atrocities like sexual violence and arson in the public domain.
Union government investigative agencies have been reluctant, slow and selective in pursuing perpetrators. “Strict action” is promised in parliament, but those responsible for the worst excesses remain untouched, forcing grieving families to beg for even minimal recognition.
The quest for peace without justice will remain futile in Manipur, which can’t be compensated by a few so-called development projects announced by Modi.
- Divided state on ethnic lines
Manipur today resembles a state under partition. Central Reserve Police Force and Assam Rifles personnel now police an ethnic border between the predominantly Meitei Imphal valley and the surrounding hills where Kukis form a majority. Instead of restoring civil order, this de facto partition has become the norm, and parallel administrations are entrenched.
The Modi government has surrendered to this balkanisation, with the prime minister himself sanctioning the divided state by visiting two separate places instead of making a bold political move to bring all the communities together first.
- Biren Singh audio sample case
The Supreme Court will next hear the N. Biren Singh audio recording case in November. Allegedly, the tapes reveal the former chief minister’s role in abetting violence and permitting Meitei groups to loot armouries. Forensic delays and the Union government’s constant foot-dragging suggest a protection racket designed to insulate BJP loyalists at any cost, even as the highest court signals its frustration.
This partisan politics remains a major obstacle in moving towards genuine reconciliation in strife-torn Manipur.
- Free movement regime and border fencing
India’s border with Myanmar, with the Free Movement Regime allowing ethnic and cultural ties within communities divided by the colonial border, has been a recurring theme of targeting by majoritarian groups. Despite protests by the states of Nagaland and Mizoram, and pleas by the Nagas and Kuki-Zos in Manipur, the Modi government sounds determined to fence the border and tighten controls on movement of the locals, all under the cover of its “national security” bravado.
Instead of winning over these ethnic groups, it reverses a major step of decriminalising the movement of people and petty trade across an artificial border bequeathed by the British colonial rulers.
- Naga Accord implementation
Nagas are the second-biggest ethnic group in Manipur and have been loudly voicing their discontent in recent weeks. Modi’s much-trumpeted Framework Agreement with Naga groups of 2015 is now a cautionary tale of failure. Nearly a decade after a supposed breakthrough, no settlement is in sight. Instead, negotiations meander pointlessly, feeding disillusionment and stoking unrest among Nagas, who now see no incentive for moderation or trust in Modi’s word.
- Poppy cultivation crisis
The region’s entanglement in the transnational drug trade has only deepened. Rather than devising real solutions for communities dependent on poppy cultivation, the government’s response has been clumsy and incendiary. It has branded entire ethnic groups as “illegals” and criminalised poverty.
Such scapegoating has converted a developmental challenge into an inflammatory ethnic wedge, fuelling the violence witnessed over the past 28 months.
- Systematic internet shutdowns
Manipur has endured India’s longest internet blackout, making it a digital pariah. Blanket shutdowns have crippled communications, gagged journalists and ensured that human rights abuses remain hidden.
These actions are about repression, not order, exposing the government’s comfort with colonial tools of control even in the 21st century. It affects education and the provision of government services, besides taking away all means of alleviating the psychological trauma undergone by the people of the state.
- Rehabilitation and resettlement crisis
Over 60,000 people remain stranded in relief camps, with no clear path home. Villages stand razed or permanently altered; hundreds of churches have been burnt and destroyed. The government’s response is primarily bureaucratic, devoid of any coherent policy for large-scale rehabilitation or reconciliation. Citizens are left in limbo, victims twice over – first of violence, then of poor governance.
To conclude, Modi’s first visit since the violence began in Manipur is an exercise in political optics, not a response to the humanitarian catastrophe. For months, silence was his only message to Manipur, which proved untenable after electoral debacle and relentless criticism.
The state needs leadership that values its people as citizens, not pawns. The wounds and failures listed above will not heal with staged visits or hollow pronouncements. They demand accountability and genuine action, neither of which the Modi government has yet shown any capacity for.