News Mania Desk/ Piyal Chatterjee / 22nd September 2024
Top security officials and government functionaries said that the state’s security establishment and the Manipur government are at odds more than ever over a number of issues, including leaked intelligence reports, a recent uptick in violence, and, most importantly, who is in charge of the Unified Command.
The purpose of the Unified Command is to guarantee coordination amongst the numerous Central Armed Police Forces, the Army, the police, and the Assam Rifles, among other forces that are present in the state. It is now led by Kuldiep Singh, a retired IPS officer and Chief Minister N Biren Singh’s security advisor. It is also responsible with making important security decisions.
“Even inputs on the security situation sent by the Chief Minister’s Office are not taken seriously by the DGP and the Security Advisor. The truth is that he (the CM) is currently completely powerless in this regard. This is not something that he can communicate directly to the Centre because that will be seen as interfering in the Centre’s wisdom,” said a top source in the government.
Top government officials claim that the CM is “completely powerless” since he is not in command.Since September 11, when violence erupted in the state and 11 people were slain in less than a week, the government and Meitei protestors have rekindled the demand, despite the chief minister’s silence on the matter.
In a letter dated September 2, MLA and the chief minister’s son-in-law, R K Imo Singh, pleaded with Union Home Minister Amit Shah to withdraw central forces from the state and give the chief minister command of the Unified Command. On September 8, the Governor was met by the ruling party’s MLAs, led by the CM, and it has been gathered that this was among the topics discussed during that meeting.
The person also mentioned an intelligence report that was “leaked” a few days after violence broke out in the Jiribam area in June.
The correspondence, addressed to the Chief Secretary, the Security Advisor, and the Director General of Police in Manipur, requested the submission of a report elucidating the reasons for the outbreak of violence in the district on June 6. The notice, which was submitted by the CMO to the DGP and the Security Advisor five months before in January, concerned the movement of around 200 Kuki-Zo terrorists from Churachandpur to districts adjoining Jiribam. The alert asked for security measures to be implemented in order to avert any unfortunate incident.
Referring to this report, the official said, “That enabled them (the government) to push all responsibility to the officers. But there are hundreds of intelligence inputs that are received, and this had been sent in January after which there were five months of peace.”
Soon after ethnic violence broke out in May of last year, Kuldiep Singh, the CM’s Security Advisor, entered the scene after P Doungel, the then-DGP, was sidelined. Then, despite the fact that the Manipur cadre contained more senior IPS officers, 1993 batch Tripura cadre officer Rajiv Singh was named the new DGP following a visit to the state by Union Home Minister Ami Shah later that month.
Subsequently, Shah declared the establishment of the Unified Command and designated Kuldiep Singh as its leader, in lieu of the Chief Minister, a Meitei who is held accountable for the violence by the Kuki-Zomi community.The May 31, 2023 decree states that the Chief Minister has the authority to convene sessions of the Unified Command as needed. As stated by
“I have realised… (the idea is) that keep this person entangled this way, and then you throw all the blame on Biren Singh. Then the Prime Minister remains spotless… Biren is a minor player in this conflict… Biren orders something and the Assam Rifles and CRPF refuse to comply,” he told the media .
