GUWAHATI: Protestors in restive Manipur clashed with security personnel on Saturday as they attempted to march to Chief Minister Yumnam Khemchand Singh’s bungalow in the Babupara area of the state capital, Imphal.
The protestors had taken out processions from four directions. However, their march was cut short by security personnel, who were adequately deployed across city areas.
Tensions escalated in the Khurai Lamlong area of Imphal East district, located about 2 km from the Chief Minister’s bungalow, when personnel dispersed the protestors by firing tear gas shells after they attempted to break through security barricades.
According to local media reports, at least 22 people were injured and admitted to a hospital.
The protestors were out on the streets at the call of the Imphal Valley-based Meitei organisation, the Coordinating Committee on Manipur Integrity (COCOMI), as the state government has allegedly not been able to stop militant attacks on civilians.
Recently, COCOMI, a conglomerate of Meitei civil society organisations, announced a boycott of the ruling BJP and set April 25 as the deadline for the government to arrest all those involved in a recent bomb attack in which two children, including an infant, were killed in Bishnupur district.
Despite the resistance on Saturday, the protestors managed to hold a rally near Kangla, where leaders of COCOMI addressed the gathering. Later, authorities allowed some COCOMI leaders to meet the Chief Minister, and they submitted a memorandum to him.
The organisation asked the state government if it would impress upon the Centre to stop the ongoing “proxy war” and ensure justice in recent violent incidents, including the killings of the two children. Further, it demanded a judicial probe into the incident of firing by personnel of a central force, which left three protestors dead in Bishnupur. The killings of the two children had sparked the protest.
Meanwhile, two persons were injured when a Casspir vehicle of a paramilitary force rammed through barricades put up by locals at Talui village in the Naga-majority Ukhrul district.
The Working Committee of Tangkhul Naga Long, in a statement, said the condition of one of the injured was critical. The village women had set up the barricades to frisk vehicles in light of the ongoing Kuki-Naga violence in parts of Ukhrul.