The Peninsula Foundation

Tag: North East

  • Consequences of the Manipur Conflagration

    Consequences of the Manipur Conflagration

    By any measure, the situation is bleak and what makes it even worse is the fact that thousands of weapons have been looted from police armouries…

    In the summer of 64 AD, nearly 2000 years ago, Rome, more or less, was completely razed to the ground in a fire that lasted six days. The hapless citizens, in utter frustration, turned on their much-despised Emperor, Nero. He was a patron of the arts, fond of music, with a talent for playing the Cithara or Kithára, an ancient Greek string instrument, not unlike our very own Sitar. Clearly that old and well-known adage “Nero played the fiddle while Rome burned”, was grossly unfair to him, not least, because the fiddle was only invented 1500 years later.

    In a manner of speaking, one cannot avoid but feel that our political establishment has, in many ways, ended up playing the proverbial fiddle as Manipur burns, as the only matters they seemingly have time for, are elections and inaugurations. And burning it is, though one would get a distinctly different impression, if our wonderful mainstream media is to be taken at face value. Fortunately, it seems that after nearly a month of unmitigated violence, they have finally been shamed into at least mentioning violence and Manipur together, though their coverage remains scanty and cursory, to say the least.

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  • Nagaland Tragedy and the SIT Farce

    Nagaland Tragedy and the SIT Farce

    Nobody’s saying that there was no conspiracy, in fact, all evidence points to one, but in which the military was clearly the scapegoat.

    Last December, this author had written about the tragic incident that occurred in Nagaland’s Mon district earlier that month (‘AFSPA in the Northeast: Is status quo the answer?’). In a tragic case of mistaken identity, six coal miners were killed by troops from a Special Forces unit. Subsequent escalation by local villagers who descended on the site four hours later, allegedly at the behest of the DSP, led to the murder of one soldier with the rest being injured, many of them seriously. They were finally able to disengage with difficulty, having to leave behind four vehicles loaded with gear and ammunition. The unruly mob subsequently set these trucks on fire, which resulted in the ammunition in the burning trucks “cooking off”, or exploding. This probably led to the death of seven others, which the police promptly pinned on the detachment that had left.

    This case is again making headlines as the Nagaland Police has charge-sheeted 30 soldiers under various sections of the IPC, including criminal conspiracy, murder, attempt to murder, voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons and disappearance of evidence. That an operational task assigned by higher headquarters, based on inputs reportedly provided by the Intelligence Bureau, constitutes a criminal conspiracy speaks volumes of the quality of the investigations. But that in no way suggests that there was no conspiracy, in fact, all evidence points to one, but in which the military was clearly the scapegoat.

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