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Opinion

Manipur horror: A shameful act

A video of two Kuki women paraded naked and assaulted, shocks the nation; but will anything really change?

Manipur horror: A shameful act
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It’s way past midnight and I should be asleep. I can’t. Not after what I’ve seen. Inadvertently and without any prior warning, I came across that viral video of two Kuki women being paraded stark naked by a mob, being groped, fingered, assaulted. They were being led, most likely, to be gangraped in the fields…and this depravity was caught on camera. What breaks first inside you? Who cries first? You the human being, you the Indian, or you the woman? I felt uncontrollable anger, the first reaction was to scream, the second brought only expletives to the tongue. But once the wave of anger passed, it was replaced by deep anguish, helplessness, and depression. If you’re a woman in India today and have seen that abominable video, you would have felt the same.

An incident like this shakes you to the core. It should make you question the state’s law and order situation, the Centre’s promise of sound governance, and the deplorable mind of the average Indian man. There were at least a hundred men with those two women, and yet not one thought that what they were orchestrating was wrong? Not one among them tried to protest, cover up, free the women? Not one in a hundred found anything wrong with what was happening in front of their eyes.

The deviancy of the incident is exacerbated by the video recording of it. Every time someone watches this video, those two women are assaulted all over again. Perversely, without this viral video, we wouldn’t even know the ground reality of the ethnic strife in Manipur. This incident took place 77 days ago! No arrests were made till this video surfaced. It’s unbelievable that such a heinous incident took place and the state authorities were oblivious to it. Obviously, they were not unaware, they were simply stuck in the quagmire of inaction. Was the lack of action a ploy to safeguard the majoritarian Meitei community? The systematic ethnic cleansing of Christians underway in the northeastern state goes against every fabric of our diverse polity. Several months into the clashes between Meitei and Kuki communities, why hasn’t peace returned to the state?

In a shocking TV interview, the Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh said that there may be hundreds of such incidents happening in the state justifying the internet ban. The internet shutdown in the state has possibly stopped the essential reporting of several horrific incidents.

It’s also an unfortunate admission by a chief minister that he doesn’t have the situation under control. Over 140 people have been killed and 60,000 have been displaced in Manipur. Why are there no demands for his resignation? Apparently, a letter was written by the North American Manipur Tribal Association (NAMTA) and Kuki academics based in India and US to the National Commission of Women (NCW) 37 days before the video surfaced chronicling the incident. This letter, along with several other complaints, were forwarded to the Manipur Chief Secretary and Director General of Police (DGP), however, no one bothered to follow-up. Won’t heads roll for this?

This one incident is extremely alarming, I loathe to even think about the hundreds of others referenced to by the CM. And as always, as is the unsaid rule of strife and war, it’s the women that are made to suffer. Abusing, assaulting, raping them is used as the ultimate weapon of shame and ignominy. Attacking women is seen as a way of weakening the morale of the men; a justification used by many who advocate not sending women into active combat. This revolting act comes at a time when we have a woman President at the helm of the nation, herself a tribal too. This incident is not just about Meiteis and Kukis alone; it’s about women and how we as a nation fail them over and over again. It cannot be business as usual, there needs to be accountability, and something finally has to change. Till then, we hang our heads in shame.

The writer is an author and media entrepreneur. Views expressed are personal

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