Manipur, Northeast, New Delhi

There are three things you never do in a small NE state: Undermine local leaders, divide and rule, push homogenisation

The most important development in the ongoing crisis in Manipur is that Union Home Minister Amit Shah has himself gone there to try and douse the fire.

It isn’t just one of those flying visits to an outpost distant from New Delhi. Land, speak to the press, hold two meetings with the state government and officials, meet some delegations and head back home to sleep at night, the usual. He has stayed there for four days.

It isn’t just the longest time he has spent in a troubled state in his years as home minister; it is probably the longest any home