AFSPA In Manipur: When Civilian Lives Are Crushed Under Military Might

The horrors civilians face in states where central armed forces operate with immunity granted by AFSPA are simply unimaginable to the rest of the country that swears by ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’ and other overt shows of jingoism. In areas tagged ‘disturbed’ where the Act is enforced, the fundamental right of a citizen enshrined under Article 21, the Right to Life, is rendered meaningless, as security personnel starting from the rank of a havildar in any of the central forces—the army, CRPF, BSF and other paramilitary—can shoot or detain a person on mere grounds of suspicion. So much so, the errant security personnel cannot be tried in any court of law without sanction from the Centre. The Act also empowers personnel to enter and search any premises without warrant as well as destroy or dismantle any structure which is suspected to harbour rebels.

That the Act is in place in Jammu and Kashmir and major parts of the Northeast also means that mainstream media and the public further distance their interest and engagement—with the former, because it is forever tied to the Pakistan angle, and with the later, because of its distance, both physically and emotionally, and the way people from the region are treated with racial bias as outsiders within the country. It is only when there are sensational incidents of excesses committed by armed forces, followed by widespread civil discontent, that AFSPA gets a mention in the national media.

ALSO READ: AFSPA: Memories And Mourning In Nagaland’s Cycle Of Violence

It is this lack of media spotlight on the Northeastern states on one hand, and the non-inclusion of the socio-cultural history of the region and its people in the syllabus of mainland India on the other, that have contributed to the idea of India stopping at West Bengal and perhaps Assam to a certain extent. This has meant that discussions around atrocities committed by security forces under the cover of AFSPA in the Northeast have been limited to the region or in the pages of human rights reports: from desecration of places of worship in Naga-inhabited areas to entire villages being cut off from the reach of the state’s administrative purview for months under the guise of ‘combing operations’, to women being raped or sexually molested, to able-bodied men being subjected to brutal physical torture, to the use of food and livestock of entire villages to feed the forces.

National and international media coverage on the horrors brought about by AFSPA in Northeast happened, to a large extent, after a protest in 2004 in Imphal by 12 meira paibi—literally meaning women torch-bearers—who stripped themselves in front of the Kangla Fort, covered only by a piece of white cloth that had ‘Indian Army Rape Us’ written in red. The story behind this iconic protest was yet another brutal assault by security forces on a civilian—the mutilated body of Thangjam Manorama, 32, was recovered the night after she was picked up from her own house over suspicion of being a member of an armed insurgent group. As the unique protest grabbed the headlines in national media, it also picked up another iconic resistance to the Act: the indefinite fast taken up by Irom Sharmila Chanu, demanding repeal of the Act. Irom Sharmila had launched her fast in 2000 after 10 civilians waiting at a bus stop were shot dead by Assam Rifles personnel in the aftermath of a bomb blast targetting one of its convoys in a nearby area. But it was the protest at Kangla that put the media spotlight on AFSPA and Manipur.

ALSO READ: Poetry | New Terror in Nagaland

Interestingly, the iconisation of Irom Sharmila as the face of the protest against AFSPA also meant that other activists, and many other people who had suffered long-term trauma earlier due to the Act, felt sidelined and did not rally behind Irom Sharmila. People across ethnic lines or political aspirations in the region have not been able to take a stand collectively and unitedly against AFSPA while continuing to undertake isolated protests. All of these contribute to the conundrum around the Act, with the political leadership of the region largely confined to token grandstanding in the way of calling for its repeal on social media, or even mentioning the issue in election manifestos.

Illustration by Saahil

The demand for repeal of AFSPA is a touchy subject with the Centre regardless of which political party is in power, despite recommendations for its scrapping from various quarters, including commissions instituted by the government of the day. It is such a touchy subject that when the Justice J.S. Verma Committee, instituted after the Nirbhaya incident to work on redefining rape laws in India recommended an amendment to Section 6 of the AFSPA, which gives the armed forces arbitrary powers and often leads to sexual violence on women, it was not taken into consideration.

ALSO READ: AFSPA: A Law That Is Discriminatory, Exclusionary, Racist

At the state level, it is either the respective state cabinet that recommends extension of the time-frame for an area to be tagged as ‘disturbed’, following which the Act continues to be re-imposed every year like clockwork, or the Centre’s representative, the Governor who takes the call. Given the current public sentiment, the Nagaland assembly is likely to pass a resolution seeking repeal of AFSPA but will that be enough to ensure the Act is removed? It is most unlikely, given the long history of the military establishment vehemently calling for the Act to be operative in the region and in the Kashmir Valley.

It is clearly evident from Union home minister Amit Shah’s statement in Parliament after the Oting incident in Nagaland that the central government is not looking to do anything concrete with regards to AFSPA. At the most, the situation on the ground might possibly lead to some areas of Nagaland exempted from purview of AFSPA, reminiscent of the lifting of the Act from parts of Greater Imphal across seven assembly constituencies in 2004 by the then Manipur government following the Kangla protest. However, it is worth noting that lifting of the Act did not stem the tide of arbitrary arrests and killings in Manipur. In fact, extra-judicial killings continued in areas where the Act is not in force.

ALSO READ: Inheritance Of Hauntings Under AFSPA In Nagaland

The Oting incident has managed to bring people from different parts of the region, cutting across community and ethnic lines, to raise a unanimous demand for the repeal of AFSPA, partly fuelled by social media updates and engagements. But the truth of the matter is that the national media has already moved onto the next big story: the unfortunate crash of an Indian Air Force helicopter in Tamil Nadu that left all 14 on board dead, including the Chief of Defence Staff, the rumblings in the Indian cricket team management and a Hindi film celebrity couple tying the knot. The unfortunate truth is that it will take more Oting-like incidents and more deaths to make the national media take more than a cursory interest in AFSPA, and for political leaders to work towards its repeal.

(This appeared in the print edition as "An Act of Brutality")

(Views expressed are personal)