New Delhi: With eleven days to go for the President’s Rule in Manipur to end, BJP’s central leadership has summoned to Delhi all the NDA MLAs in the state, including Meiteis, Kukis and Nagas, to discuss the situation on ground and explore the possibility of restoring the government in the state.
The meeting is likely to take place Monday evening, a party leader, who did not wish to be named, told ThePrint.
When President’s Rule was imposed in Manipur last February—following the political instability in the aftermath of the ethnic clashes that had first erupted in May 2023 between the largely Hindu Meitei and tribal Christian Kuki communities—the state assembly had been placed under suspended animation.
The Bharatiya Janata Party is in a majority in the 60-member Manipur assembly, which currently has 59 MLAs after the death of National People’s Party (NPP) legislator N. Kayisii last January. BJP MLAs, including seven from the Kuki-Zo community, hold 32 assembly seats. Five Janata Dal (United) MLAs had joined the BJP after the 2022 assembly elections, taking the party’s strength to 37 MLAs, effectively.
The remaining MLAs include six from Conrad Sangma-led NPP, a former BJP ally. In November 2024, the NPP, had withdrawn its support for the N. Biren Singh government in the aftermath of the conflict. However, the party continues to support the BJP at the Centre.
Another former BJP ally, the Kuki People’s Alliance, has two MLAs. Additionally, there are five MLAs from Naga People’s Front (NPF), three Independents, five from Congress, and one from JD(U).
A BJP MLA, requesting anonymity, said that 16 MLAs, including one each from NPP and NPF—both NDA allies—arrived in Delhi Sunday night. “The remaining MLAs will be arriving Monday morning,” the leader said.
Among those who have reached Delhi are Manipur Assembly Speaker Th. Satyabrata Singh, and former state minister Y. Khemchand Singh, NPP’s Th. Shanti Singh, NPF’s Awangbow Newmai, and others.
BJP’s central leadership has had several rounds of meetings over the past four months, with MLAs from the party, including those from Kuki-Zo community, and allies NPP and NPF, to assess if the situation is conducive for government formation.
What has added to the Centre’s challenges in restoring a popular government is the hard position taken by the party’s seven Kuki-Zo MLAs, who have conveyed to the central leadership that they will participate in forming a government only in case of a written assurance that their demand for a Union Territory with legislature will be met before the current assembly’s tenure ends in March 2027.
The violence in Manipur has claimed over 250 lives so far, displacing over 60,000 from both communities. Though it has gradually subsided, sporadic incidents have been fuelling volatility.
In January, a Meitei man, who had gone to meet his Kuki partner in Churachandpur, was killed by suspected Kuki militants. There was also a flare-up of tensions after some Kuki-Zo houses were set ablaze in a village in Kangpokpi district by a fringe faction of a Naga underground group last month.
(Edited by Mannat Chugh)
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