Reckoning in Manipur

Crimes by mobs highlight deep institutional failures

The disturbing video that emerged on social media of the assault on Kuki-Zomi women by a mob in Manipur in May highlights the reprehensible failure of state institutions to respond urgently and impartially to law and order problems. It was only after the video surfaced on July 19 that the police arrested and charged six people identified in the video with abduction, gang rape, and murder. The police are yet to explain why it took a viral video, circulating 77 days after the incident was registered in a first information report, for them to be galvanised into action. Even given the glacial pace at which the government works, the magnitude of the crime surely warranted a quicker response. Worse, it transpires that the police appeared to have colluded with the perpetrators. The victims spoke of being surrendered by the police, which had initially rescued them from a forest refuge, to a mob that forced them to strip and parade naked, and then publicly assaulted. The father and the brother of one of the victims were also murdered when they tried to defend their relatives. The fact that the perpetrators did not bother to conceal their actions points to a confidence in their impunity from law-enforcement agencies.

Strikingly, the police have made no effort to answer questions from the media about their role in the incident. Nor is there evidence yet that the police involved in the incident have been brought to book. Media reports have stated that the police have complained of being outnumbered by the marauding mobs. This complaint is perplexing, given that the Centre has been monitoring the situation and is said to have deployed large numbers of central forces in the state to reinstate law and order. In June, for example, the Centre sent 1,000 troopers from the Central Armed Police Forces, adding to the 114 companies from the Rapid Action Force, Border Security Force, Indo-Tibetan Border Police, and Sashastra Seema Bal, which the home ministry had already deployed in the state to bolster the presence of the Indian Army and Assam Rifles. The fact that ethnic violence is spiralling out of control — of which the video offers grim evidence — in spite of the overwhelming presence of state and central security forces surely warrants some explanation.

Though the Prime Minister has expressed regret, he has not made a statement in Parliament as being demanded by the Opposition, which has led to an impasse. Given the situation in the state, a statement by the Prime Minister will help reassure the state and the nation. Instead the government is reportedly looking to take action against the messenger, Twitter, for permitting the video to be circulated. Equally, the Manipur High Court, which would have been within its rights to take suo motu cognizance of the incident, has been conspicuously silent — unlike the Supreme Court. The failure of state institutions to protect the fundamental rights and security of its citizens should be cause for deep concern for a country that aspires to a seat at the global high table.