Villagers flee Manipur, seek refuge in neighbouring areas after militant threat

Villagers in Manipur have fled and sought refuge in neighbouring areas after a militant outfit issued threats to them in connection with a land dispute case.

Reportedly, residents of Tuinuphai Village in Manipur abandoned the hamlet after receiving threats from the United Socialist Revolutionary Army, which was sent to the village chief.

The villagers said that there is a land dispute between the United Socialist Revolutionary Army (USRA) and the United Zou Organisation (UZO).

More than 100 residents, including the elderly and children, were seen sitting in a hall to beat the winter chill and battling their hunger with rice and potato curry.

The aggrieved residents sought shelter under the aegis of philanthropic organisation, UZO at Zougal Hall in Lamka village, a few miles away from the deserted Tuinuphai village.

"Because the villagers keep talking to my brother also, so I have been aware about this, and this is the worst incident, and it is beyond my expectation that they would be coming here as refugees because they were bonafide settlers of Tuinuphai village and now they have to be chased away as though they were vagabonds, as though they don't have homes. This is total disappointment," said treasurer of Zou Youth Organisation (UZO's youth-wing), Cecelia Mamang.

Villagers further added that the armed activists ordered the residents, which numbered to around 30 households, to vacate the region within 30 minutes while they were preparing for Christmas Eve.

However, the homeless celebrated the festivities at the mercy of the philanthropic organisation.

More than a dozen insurgent groups have been fighting the government for decades in Assam and neighbouring states of northeast India, killing thousands in attacks on civilian troops and paramilitary.

The groups blame the government of plundering the region's significant mineral and agricultural resources and ignoring demands for greater autonomy and greater economic opportunities.

Myriad violent insurgencies have beset India's remote northeast region for decades and at least 50,000 people have been killed there since independence in 1947.

Some conflicts are campaigns for autonomy - for an entire state, a district or a tribal homeland - while others are clashes between numerous indigenous tribes, often over access to land.