Attacks on Power Infrastructure,Meiteis' Newest War Tactics to Oppress the Kukis, in their Genocide Pogrom to Ethnic Cleansing

IIf science has given us many innovations, electricity is the best of them. Human civilization has become very modern, and electricity is needed everywhere.

The dependency of mankind on appliances and technology which in turn depends on electricity elevates the importance of electricity in an individual’s life from the status to that of food and clothes to men. From household to economic activities, from the education sector to the healthcare sector, from freedom of expression to holding the government accountable, from providing information to being informed, the role of electricity directly or as a medium in modern men is salient. Men thus become handicapped and their daily activities grind to a standstill with its absence.

Thus, countries that can’t provide 100 per cent to their citizens’ electrification are considered underdeveloped or developing but never a developed country due to the immense role it plays in easing, enhancing and nurturing an individual’s life and creativity and the growth and development of a nation. The Indian government’s effort for 100% electrification aligns with its goal of becoming a developed country too. But is the GoI aware that thousands of its citizens are deprived of their rights to electricity by Meitei mobs attacking the electricity infrastructure? If so, will it hold the government of Manipur responsible this time for its inefficiency and failure?

Through technology, the world is truly becoming a global village. But electricity is the oxygen for this technology, for without it modern technology is as good as a broken machine. Thus one can say an attack on electricity is an attack on its developmental process, its human capital investments and its communications. Men are social beings who can’t develop to their optimal potential without an interaction with others in the society and a society to the world. Isolation of a community from being in contact with the outside world is basically oppressing one like how Kim’s family in North Korea is oppressing their citizens. This is exactly How the Meiteis oppressed the Kukis by attacking their electricity supply.

The attack on electrical infrastructure by the Meitei community amounts to war crimes for its unnecessary attacks on civilians’ basic human rights who bore no threats to anyone. Be it education or healthcare, for employees whose work depends on electricity like those working in the IT sector, private hospitals and diagnostic clinics or daily wage earners like those working in steel/iron smelting etc, they are putting thousands of lives at risk like patients in ICU or in surgical operations, denying them the basic right to education and health, and the human right to livelihood. The poor who don’t have the monetary resources to study in cities depend on online classes or free quality classes provided on different platforms like YouTube, and with board exams knocking at the door, their life without electricity means nights without studying unless they are expected to study under the stars and moon. So are for other students preparing for different competitive examinations. With the intense level of competition, even an hour lost a day could impact their future and make them lag behind their peers. Attacking innocent civilians who do no harm to them can be done only by monsters who camouflage themselves as humans

Recognizing the importance of electricity, the Supreme Court thereby held that electricity being a basic necessity, is an integral part of the right to life as enshrined under Article 21 of the Constitution of India. Attacking electrical infrastructure that affects vast areas is not only an attack on one’s right to electricity, but it has a spillover effect and attacks other fundamental rights under the right to life of Article 21 such as the Right to live with human dignity, Right to decent environment, Right to livelihood, right to health, Right against inhumane treatment and Right to timely treatment in government hospitals. Thus, shouting about the integrity of Manipur alone won’t save the integrity of Manipur, but your words and actions have to be liveable enough to co-exist.

You can’t treat your neighbours like an enemy and expect their co-operation in times of need. As a community that proclaims itself as Hindu, it is expected on their part to at least be well versed with Karmic Laws. All mankind except for the Meitei community knows that for every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction as any retaliation against their own actions is still an injustic, not karma for them. We Kukis too, can cut the lifeline of those staying in the valley, but maintaining the war ethics we refrain from committing it. But one should not always make an effort to wake the sleeping lion, just to stage a sumang Leela later.

We might be tribals but we deserve to avail the benefits of men’s innovation like all humans do, we don’t need authorisation from the megalomaniac Meitei community. It is thus important for the central government to take cognizance of these inhuman and evil acts of the Meitei community. As for the atrocities and heinous crimes against the Kukis by the Meitei, this is not their first time nor will it be their last time. It shall last as long as the Kukis are kept in the political territory of Manipur. Since our welfare and basic rights can no longer be protected under the government dominated by the Meitei community, the Kukis have the moral and democratic rights to ask for a Separate Administration and it will only be morally right to grant us one. Our injustices need a redressal and it’s the duty and responsibility on the part of the central government to give us the social and political justice we deserve.