It is inconceivable that agitationists can ever succeed in blocking the main highways leading into, say, a State such as Madhya Pradesh for more than a few hours. Yet they get away with blockading Manipur for months on end, again and again, simply because disruptions in that farthest corner of the Northeast do not cause a ripple in the rest of India. So it is hardly surprising that people in Manipur think the country does not care for them. The latest blockade, which started on August 1, has led to an acute shortage of essential commodities, with the prices of food, medicines, and fuel shooting up sky high. Ordinary people have borne the brunt of the agitation, black marketeers and hoarders are having a field day, and the central government has been a bystander to the less-than-competent handling of the situation by the Ibobi Singh government in the hapless State. The siege began when the Kukis affiliated to the Sadar Hills Districthood Demand Committee blocked National Highways 53 and 39 to press their demand for a Kuki majority district to be carved out of portions of a larger district claimed by the Naga people as part of the ‘greater Nagalim.' The Nagas responded to the SHDDC blockade with one of their own. Instead of handling both firmly, the State government appears to have only worsened ethnic tensions by getting the SHDDC to withdraw its blockade with a written assurance that the demand for a separate Kuki district would be met. The United Naga Council and the All Naga Students' Association of Manipur have since intensified their blockade.
The Centre's apathy aside, the inflexible positions taken by the protesters, and their political vision stretching no further than the narrow confines of their ethno-nationalism, are the main reason for the mess in Manipur, and in some other parts of the Northeast as well. The Meities, who form the majority ethnic group, are not blameless in this saga of exclusivist politics; the tussle between the Kukis and the Nagas cannot be separated from the larger confrontation between the nationalisms of the Meitei and the Naga. Reconciling these competing visions is not an easy task; there are no quick answers. It calls for a leadership that is prepared to think big and re-imagine the State, and the region, in progressive inclusivist fashion. More immediately, the blockades on the highways must end. They have caused immense suffering to the poorest of Manipur's 2.7 million people who cannot afford to pay black market rates for their daily essentials. The blockaders must realise that they cannot use blackmail to gain their political ends.
