A congenial atmosphere

Witoubou Newmai

The calm passing off of the ‘June 18’ this year in the State of Manipur was a rare and pleasant departure from the past. Needless to say, this is a clear indicator that all that efforts from various quarters for dialogue between the Meiteis and the Nagas are sensibly yielding fruits and must persist.

The run up to the day, and glaringly on June 18 itself, used to be highly charged affairs, especially in the valley after the 2001 unrest.

In the valley, organisations under the banners of  United Committee, Manipur (UCM) and All Manipur United Clubs Organisations (AMUCO) supported by many more organisations used to observe what they termed it as ‘The Great June Uprising’ on June 18 with much fervor. The day used to be a mega affair with volunteers of valley based organisations campaigning for weeks, if not for months, and the tone of such movements had been one of the big contributing factors for the frosty ties between the Nagas and the Meiteis.

In protest against the so-termed ‘Bangkok Declaration’ when the ceasefire between the Government of India and the NSCN-IM was declared ‘without territorial limits,’ the valley erupted in flames with burning of the Manipur Legislative Assembly secretariat and many other government structures in the month of June, 2001. June 18 saw the peak of protest where lives were claimed in the security force firing. Since then the day came to be known as ‘The Great June Uprising.’ According to AMUCO, UCM and others, the ‘June 18’ observation is also a pledge “to protect the Manipur territorial integrity and the sanctity of its territorial boundary.”

On the other hand, in the Naga areas, United Naga Council (UNC) used to protest on June 18 demanding the early resolution to the Naga political issue.

Such a diverse but grim situation used to overwhelm the social atmosphere in the month of June every year in the State of Manipur.

In the face of this grotesque atmosphere, discreet labour from certain quarters for dialogue between the Meiteis and the Nagas had have been gradually taking shape. The participation of various valley based organisations in this year’s Nagas’ seed sowing festival, the Lui-Ngai-Ni, organised by United Naga Council was one of the outcomes of those efforts for dialogue.

Following all these affairs are the softened postures of UCM, AMUCO, UNC and many other organisations in this year’s ‘June 18’ events. This is to say that the tone of UCM, AMUCO and UNC in the run up to this year’s ‘June 18’ observation was a marked departure from the previous occasions. Conversely, instead of calling bandh the Naga ‘tribe hohos’ organised prayer programmes in their respective offices on June 18, under the banner of UNC, for the early settlement of the Indo-Naga political issue.

With this, a sort of congeniality between the Nagas and the Meiteis has been achieved, and concerned organisations from both sides must keep resetting themselves, as they engage ‘elephant in the room,’ so that the ‘chance’ does not slip away.