Ratnadip Choudhury
Guwahati
The breakthrough comes just a day ahead of Home Minister P Chidambaram’s two-day visit to Manipur
This year’s Kut—the harvest festival—brings double joy to the Kukis in Manipur with the state government agreeing to their demand for creation of a separate Special Area Demarcated Autonomous Region (SADAR) hills district. The late night agreement ended the 93-day economic blockade on Manipur’s main national highway by the SADAR Hills District Demand Committee (SHDDC), but the Nagas are dead against the pact. The Kukis decided not to celebrate Kut under the shadow of the blockade with LPG, petrol and diesel running dry, acute scarcity of oxygen cylinders and life-saving drugs, and rocketing prices of essential commodities. For the last 93 days, National Highway 39, which links capital Imphal to Dimapur in Nagaland at Kangpokpi, witnessed violent clashes and burning of vehicles. Kangpokpi now wears a different look.
The SHDDC, which was not ready to budge an inch from its demand of immediate creation of SADAR hills district by carving out areas from three subdivision of Senapati district--Kangpokpi, Saikul and Saitu Gamphazol--agreed to finally end the longest-ever economic blockade in Manipur’s history.
Under the agreement, the state government will upgrade SADAR Hills as full-fledged district at the earliest after submission of a report by the District Re-organisation Committee, which was constituted by the Okram Ibobi Singh government, within three months.
The SHDDC imposed the economic blockade on 1 August. “We had a long discussion with the Chief Minister and the state government has agreed to our demand. Therefore, we decided to end the blockade. Nothing can be better for our people with news arriving on the auspicious day of Kut,” SHDDC President Ngamkhohao Haokip, the firebrand Kuki youth leader who led the movement of separate districthood, said.
The agreement was signed between Ngamkhohao Haokip and Tonghen Kipgen, President and General Secretary of SHDDC respectively, and Chief Secretary DS Poonia and Secretary to Chief Minister Sumant Singh. The breakthrough comes just a day ahead of Home Minister P Chidambaram’s two-day visit to Manipur. “We had taken up the matter with the Home Minister and he assured us that he would ask the Ibobi government take concrete steps. This is a victory for our people, but we will not tolerate if the government does not implement the agreement,” warned Haokip while talking to TEHELKA over the phone from Kangpokpi.
According to the copy of the memorandum of understanding signed between the state government and the SHDDC available with TEHELKA:
1. The government has agreed to upgrade Sadar Hills to a full-fledged district at the earliest after the submission of report of the District Re-organisation Committee.
2. The government has agreed to create more subdivisions by bifurcating three subdivisions. Kangpokpi subdivision would be divided into Champhai and T Vaichong subdivisions with headquarters at Champai and T. Vaichong. Saikul subdivision would be divided into Saikul and Island subdivisions with headquarters at Saikul and Island. Saitu-Gamphazol subdivision would be divided into Saitu-Gamphazol and Kangchup Geljang subdivisions with headquarters at Gamnom Saparmeina and Kangchup Geljang respectively. The three subdivisions would be inaugurated within this month.
3. The Manipur government has also agreed to withdraw all legal cases against SHDDC leaders and volunteers and other cases related to the agitation.
The issue became contentious since the Nagas in Manipur are dead against the idea of creating a separate SADR hills district. The apex body of Nagas, United Naga Council (UNC), imposed a counter blockade on 21August. The Nagas are opposed to the idea since they do not want any division of Naga-inhabited areas. The Nagas are in majority in the four hill district of Manipur--Ukhrul, Chandel, Senapati and Tamenglong.
“The state government’s decision shows that the Ibobi government is trying to divide the tribes of Manipur before the Assembly election. The Nagas should have been consulted,” a senior UNC leader said over the phone from Senapati. “UNC will decide the next course of action; we will not give an inch of the Naga-inhabited areas,” he added. The Nagas cite a MoU signed on 10 November, 1992, in Imphal, in which the Manipur government committed to safeguard their interests.
The signing of the agreement, just before Chidambaram’s visit, shows New Delhi involvement in the breakthrough. Assembly elections in Manipur are slated for February 2012 with 20 important tribal seats at stake.
With inputs from Sarat Chandra Sharma in Kongpokpi
Ratnadip Choudhury is a Principal Correspondent with Tehelka.
ratnadip@tehelka.com