New Delhi: Two of the four missing Kuki-Zo civilians, abducted allegedly by a Meitei crowd, have been found dead in a jungle in Manipur, not far from where they were last seen, ThePrint has learnt.
The four missing civilians were intercepted, dragged out and abducted, in police presence, while travelling from Churachandpur to Imphal in a Bolero car, Tuesday. The two men who were abducted have been identified as John Thangjalam (25) and Jamkhotang (40).
The bodies of two of the four Kuki-Zo civilians — a man (Jamkhotang) and a woman — have now been found, with multiple injuries and bullet wounds, which authorities suspect led to their death, sources in Manipur police told ThePrint.
“It appears that the two were badly thrashed, shot and left in the jungle. The bodies were sent for a postmortem examination but are yet to be handed over to the family,” said one source.
A search operation to locate the other two is still on. According to police sources, three of the missing civilians were family members of an Army soldier posted in Leh.
On 7 November, a Bolero carrying five persons, including two women, was intercepted by an angry crowd that forcibly took away four of them, while one managed to escape, according to a statement by Manipur police.
A leader of the Indigenous Tribal Leaders’ Forum (ITLF), a civil society organisation of Kuki-Zo tribes, had earlier told ThePrint that the family was travelling to attend a wedding in Churachandpur, but “accidentally” landed in a Meitei area in Kangpokpi district.
They might have taken an internal route connecting Churachandpur to Kangpokpi instead of the main road, the ITLF leader had said.
The man in his 60s, who escaped the angry crowd, was subsequently rescued by the police and flown to Dimapur where he is currently undergoing treatment, police said.
“The man is the father of the soldier. He is critical and undergoing treatment. He was brutally thrashed by the crowd but was rescued by police on duty,” said the source, adding that the Manipur police have deployed “teams” to search for the two other missing persons.
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Cycle of violence
Besides serving as another grim reminder of the ongoing cycle of violence in Manipur, the abduction stoked fresh violence in parts of the state.
As word spread about the abduction, armed Kuki militants allegedly shot at a group of people in Kangchup area, along Imphal West and Kangpokpi districts, in which seven, including two policemen and a woman, were injured Tuesday.
According to a second police source, the killing of Chingtham Anand Kumar, a senior Meitei police officer, who was shot dead by suspected tribal militants in Tengnoupal district on 31 October, prompted a similar cycle of violence in the state reeling under ethnic clashes since May this year.
In the wake of Kumar’s killing, the Manipur government declared the outfit World Kuki-Zo Intellectual Council (WKZIC) a banned group under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, stating that it called for members of the community to stock arms and ammunition to face “war”.
Combing operations were also launched by the state administration to catch Kumar’s killers, following which many Kukis fled to Moreh and camped outside a post of Assam Rifles, accusing Manipur commandos of ransacking their homes, looting their belongings and assaulting them.
In another incident reported on 6 November, two teenagers who had gone towards the Sekmai area in Imphal West district on a two-wheeler to attend a function, went missing Sunday morning. Police later recovered their phones wrapped in a black polythene packet near an oil pump in the Senapati district. The road to this district passes through the Kuki-dominated Kangpokpi district.
According to the police, these two incidents “led to the Bolero mishap”.
“Things were returning to normal but these two incidents stoked fresh violence. First the senior officer was killed by a sniper, then the two Meitei teenagers went missing and their phones were recovered from a Kuki area. In retaliation, the Meiteis then surrounded the Bolero and attacked the Kuki occupants,” said the second source.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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