Terror – Suspect Held, NIA Believes Transnational Gangs Fomenting Trouble in Manipur
Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Sept 30: With north-eastern state of Manipur continue to be on the boil for over five months, the country’s top anti-terror machinery the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Saturday arrested a terror suspect in Manipur’s hill district Churachandpur.
In a post on X, the NIA said the terror accused Seiminlun Gangte has been arrested in a transnational conspiracy case involving terrorist leaders in Bangladesh and Myanmar. The suspect was being brought to Delhi for questioning and further investigation. The accused and his network in Myanmar and Bangladesh sought to exploit the Manipur crisis, the anti-terror agency said.
The NIA said the terror suspect was instrumental in a “conspiracy with Myanmar- and Bangladesh-based leadership of terror outfits to wage war against India by exploiting the ethnic unrest in Manipur.” Gangte was also the main accused in the car bomb blast on June 22 in Manipur’s Kwakta that killed a person. A Scorpio SUV parked near a small bridge had exploded on June 22 in what was seen as a serious escalation of violence. The attack had the typical characteristics of trained terrorist hands, sources had said.
The NIA, however, did not said which terror group Gangte belonged to.
Some 25 Kuki insurgent groups, mostly based in Churachandpur, have signed a trilateral suspension of operations (SoO) agreement with the centre, the state and the military, under which the insurgents are to stay at designated camps and their weapons kept in monitored storages. There are allegations, however, that some insurgents of groups that have signed the SoO agreement have been taking part in the Manipur violence. The NIA had filed this case on its own in July.
“Investigation… revealed that Myanmar and Bangladesh-based militant groups have entered into a conspiracy with a section of militant leaders in India to indulge in incidents of violence with an intention to drive a wedge between different ethnic groups and to wage war against the government of India,” the NIA said in the statement today.
“And for this purpose, the leadership have been providing funds to buy arms, ammunition and other types of terrorist hardware which are being sourced both, from across the border, as well as from other terrorist outfits active in north-eastern states to stoke the current ethnic strife in Manipur,” the NIA said.
Gangte is the second terror suspect to be arrested in Manipur in the past nine days. On September 22, the NIA arrested Moirangthem Anand Singh in connection with a terror case.
Tribal-dominated Churachandpur, however, continue to suffer in logistics needing urgent transport facilities to specialist hospitals at least for emergency patients amid lack of supplies, facilities and medical professionals.
The top medical professionals said those suffering from serious cardiac problems and conditions like brain haemorrhage need fast intervention, which unfortunately was impossible to get due to no proper transport. A helicopter service from Churachandpur that was announced by Home Minister Amit Shah in early June flew for some time and stopped. It hasn’t been restarted yet.
“The helicopter service can save a lot of lives. This is the immediate priority,” the doctors said. Many patients from the Kuki-Zo tribes who suffered from critical illnesses have died in Churachandpur since they couldn’t be transported to Guwahati in Assam or Aizawl in Mizoram, the doctor said.
Going to Imphal hospitals for Kuki patients is impossible due to risk of violence and road blockades. Manipur’s capital Imphal has some well-equipped hospitals, but road blockades and the risk of violence are too much of a risk for patients to attempt a drive to Imphal. An ambulance was set on fire in Imphal West’s Iroisemba in early May, killing an 8-year-old child, his mother and a relative.
“The drive to Aizawl takes 12 hours to a full day, sometimes two days if the road conditions do not allow it. We request the central government to restart the helicopter service. That’s the only way to take critical patients fast to good hospitals,” the doctor said, explaining the problems in taking critically ill patients by road in the hilly region in the absence of the helicopter service.
In a district with population in lakhs, the number of specialist medical professionals is too low to handle the sheer number of patients awaiting treatment. Churachandpur urgently needs cardiologists, neurologists and other such doctors.
