“She Tried to Be Strong”: Manipur Gang Rape Survivor Dies Awaiting Justice

On the morning of January 6, a young Kuki woman from Manipur, still recovering from a brutal gang rape she survived during the ethnic violence of May 2023, called her younger sister to her bedside. Too weak to sit up, she asked to see their Christmas photographs one last time. The sisters scrolled through the pictures quietly before the younger one left for her grandmother’s house, telling her, “Get well soon, sis. I’ll come back soon.”

Less than a week later on January 11, the survivor passed away 

The woman was abducted, assaulted, and allegedly gang-raped in Imphal on May 15, 2023, just days after violence erupted between Meitei and Kuki communities. 

Her family says the illness that killed her was compounded by the trauma she never recovered from, and by a justice system that failed her till the end.

Nearly three years after the assault, no arrests have been made in the case, despite a detailed first information report (FIR) filed in July 2023. 

“She didn’t die because she was weak,” her mother said. “She died because everything that happened to her was never addressed.” 

Abducted, Beaten, Raped

 According to the FIR, a copy of which Outlook has seen, she filed months after the incident, the woman was abducted on May 15, 2023, around 5 pm near Baby Seikam School in Imphal’s New Checkon area, shortly after clashes between Meitei and Kuki communities erupted.

Four men allegedly forced her into a purple Maruti Swift, took her to Wangkhel Ayangpall, and assaulted her. She told police that she was beaten and slapped repeatedly, after which a mob, including women, was called to the spot. At one point, she heard someone instruct the group to call members of Arambai Tenggol, a Meitei vigilante group.

Four armed men, dressed in black, allegedly arrived soon after. The woman told police that one woman in the mob explicitly instructed them to kill her.

Instead, she was shoved into another vehicle and driven to isolated hilltop locations where the men allegedly debated killing her.

 She said the men then pushed her into a white Bolero and drove her to isolated hilltop locations, assaulting her throughout the journey. “They kept asking me whether I would remember their faces,” she stated, adding that whenever she responded or remained silent—“they would slap me” and at times strike her with the butt of their guns.

The survivor told the police that she fell at the feet of one of the men, who appeared to be the oldest, and begged for her life. “I promised them that I would never return to Imphal,” she stated. “I told them, just let me go, I want to meet my parents.”

Instead, she was driven to another hilltop location, where she was again dragged out and beaten. One blow to her face with the butt of a gun was so severe that she blacked out. When she regained consciousness, bleeding heavily, she said the men told her they would let her live “if I let them have sex with me.”

In the complaint, she stated that three of the four men then raped her in turns. One of them allegedly suggested trying “double penetration”, but another objected after asking her age and being told she was 18. “She is too young,” the older man reportedly said.

By then, she told police, her ears, face, and head were bleeding so badly that “my clothes and face were drenched in blood”.

An argument then broke out among the men, with one insisting she should be killed and the others opposing it. As they attempted to flee, the vehicle hit her, causing her to fall down a slope. She managed to reach a road below, where an auto-rickshaw driver hid her under vegetables and took her to Bishnupur police station.

Even there, she wrote in the F.I.R, fear followed her. On hearing that the police personnel who would escort her were from the Meitei community, she begged the driver to take her home without police assistance, saying she did not trust them.

“Ashamed and Traumatised” 

While speaking to Outlook, the mother revealed that the girl was initially reluctant to file the complaint as she was ashamed, embarrassed, and deeply traumatised. “Her mental health was not stable at that time,” she said.

The turning point came after another sexual assault during the violence made national headlines. The viral video made the Prime Minister Narendra Modi break his silence on the ethnic conflict going on in Manipur. 

“After what happened to the two other girls, she found the courage. She said she could not let this happen to her as well. That is when she decided to file the FIR,” her mother told Outlook. 

Even after filing the complaint, the family says there were no arrests, no updates, and no visible progress.

“The police have not approached us,” the mother said. “I went once to the Kangpokpi police station. They said they were waiting for updates from Imphal.” 

Accessing courts, she added, was nearly impossible.

“Everything is in Imphal—courts, hospitals, administration. For us in the hills, there is nothing.”

‘Girl With Modest Dreams’

Her mother describes her as a simple child who was happy with little things and wanted to open her own salon. She did not study after class 8th.  

The government, according to her mother, had promised rehabilitation and assistance, including support to start the salon. Some monetary help was routed through the Deputy Commissioner’s office in Kangpokpi, but the family never appeared before the Justice Geeta Mittal Committee, a three-member committee of former women high court judges who is responsible for Overseeing relief and rehabilitation of victims and ensuring compensation to those affected. 

The survivor’s younger sister remembers her as someone who tried hard to appear strong.

“She never talked about killing herself or anything like that in front of me,” she said while speaking to Outlook. “She didn’t want to worry me.”

The last time she saw her, her sister was sick but smiling.

“She was lying on her back. She asked to see our Christmas pictures. We looked at them together. I said goodbye and told her I would come back soon.”