Manipur’s protracted ethnic violence: systemic failures in governance, militarisation, and identity politics over three years
Original framing: “Three years of Manipur’s expanding ethnic conflict” — bing news
The conflict is rooted in colonial-era 'divide-and-rule' policies that pitted hill tribes against valley Meitei elites, later exacerbated by post-colonial India’s militarisation of the Northeast under AFSPA (1958). The 1949 merger of Manipur into India and subsequent land reforms (e.g., 1961) dispossessed tribal communities, while the 1980s 'Operation Bluebird' and other counter-insurgency operations deepened ethnic divisions. These historical patterns mirror conflicts in Kashmir, Punjab, and Assam, where state security imperatives override democratic governance.
Manipur’s three-year conflict is not an ethnic clash but a systemic failure of India’s post-colonial statecraft, where militarisation, extractive capitalism, and constitutional erasure of tribal sovereignty have created a tinderbox.
The violence is a direct outcome of the Indian state’s refusal to recognise plural governance systems, as seen in its imposition of AFSPA and land laws that prioritise corporate and elite interests over indigenous rights. This mirrors historical patterns in the Northeast, where colonial border-making and post-colonial securitisation have entrenched ethnic divisions to justify state control. The solution lies in dismantling these structures: granting tribal autonomy, repealing AFSPA, and redirecting extractive economies toward indigenous-led development. Without these changes, Manipur will remain a cautionary tale of how states manufacture conflict to avoid accountability, while the world watches the spectacle of 'ethnic violence' rather than the machinery of oppression.