Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and Manipur Chief Minister N. Biren Singh held a series of meetings in Imphal on Saturday to discuss ethnic violence that has been ongoing since May 3. The violence has so far killed 105 people and injured over 320. Sarma, who is also the Convenor of BJP-led North-East Democratic Alliance (NEDA), arrived in Manipur for a day-long visit to hold separate meetings with MLAs and different ethnic groups at a hotel in Imphal.
Meanwhile, the Central government announced that it has formed a Peace Committee, with Manipur Governor Anusuiya Uikey as the Chairperson, to bring normalcy to the violence-hit state. The Committee will also include Chief Minister N. Biren Singh, few state Ministers, MPs, MLAs, leaders from different political parties, former civil servants, educationists, litterateurs, artists, social workers and representatives of different ethnic groups.
The mandate of the Committee is to facilitate the peacemaking process among various ethnic groups of the state, including peaceful dialogue and negotiations between conflicting parties or groups.
While addressing a press conference in Manipur on June 1, Union Home Minister Amit Shah had announced that a Peace Committee under Governor Uikey will be set up, which will have representatives of all political parties, besides representatives from the ethnic communities and social organisations.
The Commission of Inquiry, set up by the MHA on June 4 to probe the violence, arrived in Imphal on Friday. The Commission under the chairmanship of the Gauhati High Court’s former Chief Justice Ajai Lamba would soon start their inquiry. Former IAS officer Himanshu Shekhar Das and retired IPS officer Aloka Prabhakar are the other two members of the Commission.
The panel would probe the causes and spread of the violence and riots targeting members of different communities. The sequence of events leading to, and all the facts related to the strife, whether there were any lapses or dereliction of duty in this regard on the part of any of the responsible authorities and individuals, the adequacy of the administrative measures taken to prevent, and to deal with the violence and riots.
