By IRNA,
Guwahati, India : India’s northeastern state of Manipur has turned into a lawless region.
A state literally on the throes of complete breakdown with hospitals putting on hold all routine surgeries with no oxygen cylinders available, while stocks of all essentials, baby food, and life saving drugs, almost drying up.
An indefinite economic blockade since the past one week enforced by various Naga tribal groups to protest the Manipur government’s decision not to allow separatist leader Thuingaleng Muivah to visit his birthplace has literally brough the state to a halt.
Hundreds of trucks carrying essentials and medicines were stranded in the adjoining state of Nagaland with protestors laying a seige on National Highways 39 – the only lifenine to Manipur, to protest the state government’s decision not to allow Muivah, general secretary of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) separatist group, to visit his birthplace in Ukhrul district.
“We have stopped all routine surgeries from today (Monday) with supplies of oxygen cylinders getting exhausted,” Y. Mohen, superintendent of the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS), said.
RIMS is the only medical college and hospital in Manipur, the biggest healthcare facility in the state of about 2.4 million people.
Landlocked Manipur depends on supplies from outside the region with trucks from the rest of India carrying essentials passing through Nagaland.
“The ongoing blockade has resulted in acute shortage of food, medicine and other essential commodities in the state and very soon the entire life support system in the state would collapse,” Babloo Loitongbam, leader of Human Rights Alert, a leading rights group in the state, said.
The group has since sent an open letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Monday seeking his personal intervention.
“A liter was pertrol was selling at Rs 200, a cooking gas cylinder sold at Rs 1,500, while a kilogram of rice was selling at Rs 60 to Rs 70,” Sunil Singh, a local resident in Imphal, said.
Items like baby food and other essentials were becoming scarce and even if someone was willing to pay double the actual price it was not readily available.
Simmering tension continues in the bordering areas between Manipur and Nagaland after security forces Thursday killed three supporters of Muivah and injured 70 more in clashes with Naga protestors who wanted Muivah to travel to his birthplace.
The Manipur government had banned 75-year-old Muivah’s trip to his home village, saying it could stoke unrest.
Muivah has since deferred his visit to his birthplace in Ukhrul district, about 220 km from Mao.
A police spokesperson said several areas in Manipur’s Senapati district, dominated by Nagas, have blocked the highway by resorting to sit-in protests leading to disruption in road communication between Manipur and the rest of the country.
“It is nothing less than anarchy in Manipur now,” said T. Singh, a college teacher.
The NSCN-Isak Muivah (NSCN-IM) is operating a ceasefire with New Delhi since 1997 with the two sides holding close to 60 rounds of peace talks aimed at ending one of India’s longest running insurgencies.
The Manipur government maintains the ceasefire with the NSCN-IM does not extend beyond Nagaland and hence Muivah’s visit to Manipur was not acceptable.
The NSCN-IM had earlier demanded that all Naga-inhabited areas in the northeast, including Manipur, be integrated by slicing off parts of three neighbouring states to unite 1.2 million Nagas and create a Greater Nagaland.
The demand is strongly opposed by the states of Assam, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh.
The violent insurgency in Nagaland has claimed around 25,000 lives since the country’s independence in 1947.