Security personnel during a search operation and area domination in Manipur on Monday.
Credit: PTI Photo
Guwahati: In a major escalation of violence in conflict-torn Manipur, at least 10 suspected militants belonging to Hmar community were killed during an encounter with the security forces in Jiribam district on Monday.
One CRPF jawan was also injured in the gunfight.
A statement issued by the Manipur government in the evening said the incident took place at around 3pm when a CRPF post situated at Jakuradhor and the Borobekra police station, situated nearby, were attacked by the armed militants. "The security forces retaliated strongly. Due to the attack, one CRPF constable named Sanjeev Kumar sustained bullet injury and has been evacuated to Silchar Medical College in Assam for treatment," said the statement.
The statement said CRPF and police retaliated to the attack and the gunfight continued for about 45-minutes. A search carried out in the area after the firing found bodies of 10 persons and sophisticated weapons. The recovered weapons included three AK series rifles, four SLRs, two INSAS, one RPG, one pompi gun, magazines and helmets, said the statement.
Although the police statement did not mention the ethnicity of the deceased, Hmar Students' Association issued a statement later in the evening stating that those killed by the forces belonged to the Hmar community. Hmars are ethnically part of the greater Kuki-Zo community.
Village volunteers
Reacting to the incident, the Committee on Tribal Unity (COTU), a forum of Kuki-Zo-Hmar organisation, claimed that those killed were "village volunteers," who gathered to "defend" their villages following information about entry of 50 armed men of Arambai Tenggol, a Meitei radical group, in the police station. "The committee is baffled why the CRPF need to retaliate when they know that the Kuki-Zo community have never trained their guns towards any central forces, the army or the Assam Rifles in the past 17 months of the conflict," it said. The COTU and the Kuki-Zo Council, another forum of Kuki-Zo organisations, issued a call for "shutdown" from 5am to 6pm on Tuesday in view of the incident.
The Jiribam district administration also issued an order for clamping curfew in the district fearing further violence.
Fresh tension gripped Jiribam after a woman belonging to Hmar community was allegedly raped and burnt alive by suspected Meitei armed persons on Friday. Kuki-Zo-Hmar organisations in the district launched a protest seeking action against those responsible in the attack.
The incident took place on a day two farmers were injured in firing allegedly by Kuki insurgents along the Meitei-dominated Imphal East and Kuki-dominated Kangpokpi.
Manipur has remained roiled in the Meitei-Kuki conflict since May last year in which nearly 240 people have been killed and over 60,000 others displaced. Sporadic incidents of violence have continued despite the presence of a large number of security forces including the army.