November 25, 2004: KYKL militants shot six examination invigilators in their legs in capital Imphal for allegedly encouraging students to take recourse to unfair means to pass the test. Two women accused of doing the same were beaten up and warned of harsher punishment if they repeated the mistake.
March 12, 2004: KYKL imposed 'prohibitions' around examination centres' as part of its 'Operation New Kangleipak' programme for 'smooth conduct' of the Class 12 examinations in Manipur.
June 27, 2003: KYKL issued 'ban' notices on three branches of the stateCouncil for Educational Research and Training, while accusing them of inactivity and corruption.
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March 3, 2003: KYKL expelled three students for 'examination malpractices' reportedly with the approval of the Council of Higher Secondary Education, Manipur (CHSEM) during the examinations at Pole Star College, Wabagai. The outfit also rebuked two invigilators for 'negligence' during the examinations.
March 21, 2002: KYKL militants killed an examination invigilator and injured six others in separate incidents on the first day of annual examinations of the Board of Secondary Education.
Such recourse to 'moral campaigns' has not been a prerogativeof the KYKL alone. All major militant groups in the state have, since years,tried to play moral guardians and have sought to impose their will on a haplesspublic. The state, regrettably, has consistently failed to provide basicsecurity to its citizens, and the militants have succeeded in projecting animage of 'protectors' of the lives and traditions of the people. They have beenparticularly astute in their choice of issues, issuing diktats banning substanceabuse among the drug-riddled youth, freeing the educational system frommalpractices, and targeting corruption in government.
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Militants have alsointervened periodically during elections in favour of, or against, particularcandidates. During the last Parliamentary elections in April 2004 the BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP) state Chief, Thounaojam Chaoba Singh, had to step down fromhis post amidst threats to his life from the militants. Previously, in February2004, the BJP chief had to issue two 'mercy petitions' asking the outfit tospare his life. In another incident, former Director General of Police ofManipur, Y. Jugeshwor Singh, was shot dead by KYKL militants on April 24, 2004,in front of his residence in Imphal. The KYKL claimed that Singh had disobeyedits diktats and was campaigning for the BJP candidate.
The capitulation of the state administration to the militants is abject. OnAugust 30, 2003, for instance, I.S. Laishram, the Revenue Commissioner of the stategovernment 'surrendered' to the KYKL after he was singled out by the groupfor corruption during his tenure as the Education Commissioner. In fact, inAugust that year, a government notification had specifically asked all officialsin the state not to abide by the directives of the militants. Laishram alsoreportedly refused to accept the security provided by the police, believing thatthe militants would get to him despite such protection. He was confined to aKYKL camp for a week and was subsequently released on September 7 after hepromised to seek voluntary retirement. The state government, however, chose todismiss him from service for having succumbed to the militants' pressure.
Earlier, in December 2002, the KYKL had threatened to execute six people,including the School Education Minister, Maniruddin Sheikh, for a scam in theSchool Education Department. The other five included a Deputy Secretary in theDepartment, who was alleged to have collaborated with the Minister in the'illegal appointment' of officers in a Central government funded project.
Groups like the United National Liberation Front (UNLF),the People's Liberation Army (PLA)and People's Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK)regularly conduct publicity seeking exercises such as setting fire to drugs,breaking alcohol bottles and destroying video cassettes of Hindi andpornographic movies in a bid to project themselves as protectors of state'sculture and moral values. It was against this backdrop that the KYKL statementof January 6, 2005, made references to the integral cultural values and therestoration of the independence and dignity of Manipur society, declaring that,"for a society struggling to maintain its identity and achieveself-determination, it was essential to lay the foundations for aself-sufficient economy. The imposition of the phanek as school andcollege uniforms was a tiny step in this direction. It would provide betteremployment and income for the state's handloom weavers."
There are indications that the practice has been taken up by relatively smallergroups such as the Islamist group, the People's United Liberation Front (PULF)as well. The PULF had asked Muslim girls in the state to restrict themselves towearing only 'traditional Muslim dresses'. A lawyer's house in Imphal had beenattacked by PULF cadres, who alleged that his daughters had become 'too modernfor comfort'. On December 6, 2004, PULF cadres shot at and injured a Muslimyouth at Changamdabi locality in Imphal for consuming alcohol and violatingIslamic law.
These various incidents are only the tip of the iceberg. Militants have engagedin hundreds of lesser acts of intimidation, imposing minor punishments onviolators or issuing warnings that have secured necessary compliance before themore extreme penalties become 'necessary'. These groups were able to mountenormous pressure on the state on several occasions, including the August 2004 Manorama incident, in which Manipur witnessed violent demonstrationsfollowing the alleged rape and killing of a woman PLA cadre by Assam Riflespersonnel.
Significantly, the extremist groups appear to have consolidated theirposition in the state through such actions, and there is substantial popularambivalence with regard to their actions. The state is seen increasingly asfailing and corrupt and any action that appears to impose some principles ofright conduct wins a wide following among the people. Indeed, since the outbreakof militancy in the region, militant groups in most affected states haveactively pushed similar 'moral' agendas and have secured popular support as aresult demonstrating their moral 'upper hand' over the administration.
In itsheyday in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) issued decrees banningprivate tuitions in Assam. More recently, in November 2004, the NationalSocialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah) (NSCN-IM)in Nagaland asked all the private schools not only to register themselves withthe outfit but also brought out a separate list of holidays to be observedstrictly by all the educational institutions in the state.
At a time when popular support for the militant outfits is on a decline in otherstates of the region, such recourse to essentially populist measures have helpedthe violent groups in Manipur to hold on to their constituency of supporters.Even though the KYKL's decree on the dress code has elicited little positiveresponse from the people, there have been instances when student organisationsin the state, such as the All Manipur Student's Union (AMSU), have come outopenly in support of the group's initiatives for 'cleansing' the educationalsystem.
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In June 2002, the Manipur People's Party (MPP), following similardemands by the KYKL, asked for the immediate resignations of Manipur AssemblySpeaker, T. Haokip, state Education Minister, Manirudin Sheikh, and Hill AreasCommittee chairman, Songchinkhup, from their posts for involvement in allegedcorrupt practices. There has been some feeble opposition from 'civil society'organisations to incidents such as the shooting of the Manipur University ViceChancellor, but this counts for little, particularly as far as the actions ofthe militant groups are concerned. The only categorical statement ofcondemnation of the KYKL's move came from another militant organization, theUNLF, which, in a December 21, 2004, Press Release condemned the 'punishment' asan 'act of grudge'.
Visibly, militant decrees on their 'moral code' constitute an assertion of thestrength in the face of unending counter-insurgency operations by the state.Regrettably, the state has produced little by way of a coherent response, beyonda continuance of ongoing military operations, which have been severely limitedin impact as the militants exploit the porous border with Myanmar to perfection.The state government, riddled as it is by corruption and abysmal ineptitude, isitself a frequent target of extremist intimidation in this context and is, infact, responsible for the general conditions of breakdown and collapse ofconfidence that have made the actions of the militants not only possible, but,in some measure, even popular.
