A video of two women being beaten and gangraped by a group of people in Manipur two months ago was widely shared on social media groups on Wednesday. The video shows the women being carried around naked by the group. No high-ranking police officer said anything about the film, but mid-level police officials confirmed what happened and said it happened on May 4. A mob of about 800–1000 people also killed two family members of the women, according to the FIR that HT saw.
A police officer who knew about the case. “The chief of that village made the complaint with us at the Saikul police station in the Kangpokpi district. When we got the report last month, there was no FIR. The incident happened in Thoubal, so the case was sent to the Nongpok Sekma police office.
As the horrible video of the attack went viral on Wednesday night, the Indigenous Tribal Leaders Forum (ITLF) put out a press release in which they condemned the attack and asked the National Commission for Women and the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes to look into it. The ITLF members said that this kind of thing happened a lot in Manipur in the first few days of the fighting. HT couldn’t tell right away if there were other cases like this.
A copy of the FIR that HT saw said that the event took place on May 4 in the village of B Phainom.
Around 3 p.m. on May 4, between 800 and 1,000 bad people with guns went into the village of B Phainom in the Kangpokpi district. On May 4, the ethnic fights between tribal and non-tribal groups that had started the day before in the valley continued. At least 150 people have died and about 40,000 people have had to move because of the fighting so far.
The village head’s lawsuit said, “The violent mob broke into all the houses and burned them down after stealing all the valuables and cash, including furniture, electronics, utensils, clothes, grains, cattle, domestic animals, etc., leaving us all homeless.”
The report said that five villagers from one family had run away to a forest and were saved by a police team from Nongpok Sekmai Police team. They were on their way to Nongpok Sekmai PS with a police team. On the way, though, a mob stopped them and took them from the police near Toubul (Sekmai khunou), which is about 2 km from Nongpok Sekmai PS.
Among the five, a 21-year-old woman was also reportedly gang-raped by the crowd. A 19-year-old man was also killed when he tried to stop the mob from sexually abusing his sister. He was the brother of the woman and the son of the man who was killed.
The FIR said, “The three women were able to leave the scene with the help of some locals who knew them.”
On June 21, the village head made the complaint. In the FIR, the police wrote that the case could not be reported on time because of tensions between different groups.
An activist who has been working on the case said that the remaining family members and other locals left their homes and moved to a government camp in Churachandpur.
HT tried to get a word from Manipur police director general Rajiv Singh, but after many phone calls and text messages, he didn’t answer.
Since May 3, the northeastern state has been torn by ethnic clashes, mostly between the tribal Kukis, who live mostly in the hill areas, and the majority Meiteis, who are the main group in Imphal Valley. At least 150 people have died and more than 50,000 have been forced to leave their homes because of the fighting.
First, there were fights in Churachandpur town on May 3, after Kuki groups called for protests against a planned change to the state’s reservation matrix that would give the Meitei community scheduled tribe (ST) status.
Violence spread quickly through the state, which has a lot of ethnic tensions. Tens of thousands of people were forced to leave their burning homes and neighborhoods and go into the bush, often crossing state borders to do so. Even though the Indian Army, Assam Rifles, and different units of the CRPF and BSF are stationed in the state to bring normalcy back, the Internet is still not back.
