"To Incite Hate, Mistrust": Manipur Government Flags "Doctored Audio Clip"

The Manipur government on Monday said disinformation is being spread using a "doctored audio clip" of Chief Minister N Biren Singh to sabotage peace plans in the ethnic violence-hit state. The state government had on August 7 issued a similar statement on the matter.

Monday's statement came after the news website 'The Wire' reported the purported audio file has been submitted to the Commission of Inquiry set up by the Home Ministry to look into the Manipur violence.

"State government views such acts of spreading misinformation/disinformation through such doctored clips as anti - national activities for likelihood of inciting hatred and mistrust amongst communities, thereby trying deliberately to disturb peaceful co-existence of communities to escalate the current law and order issues in the state, more particularly to derail the peace initiatives being started by both state and central governments," the state government said in the statement on Monday.

The state government said the law-and-order situation has improved in the last three-four months. However, shelling of rockets and bombs in fringe areas such as Kangvai, areas bordering Bishnupur, Imphal East, Moreh and Jiribam by miscreants have been reported from time to time, the state government said.

Government sources said a first information report (FIR) was filed after heavy, long-range projectiles were launched from the direction of the hills towards Bishnupur as recently as August 10. They said the state government plans to come out with a list of incidents with evidence of firing by suspected insurgents, using "heavy weapons", from the hills towards farmers and common people living near the foothills.

Search operations and area domination were conducted by security forces in the fringe and vulnerable areas of hill and valley districts. During the search operations the following recoveries were made:

i.67 (sixty-seven) Improvised Mortar shells, 25 (twenty-five) Fuse primer, 09... pic.twitter.com/G8CEd7Zilj

— Manipur Police (@manipur_police) August 19, 2024

"Police and other security agencies have been taking steps to book the culprits and to deter them. Many FIRs have been filed in this regard and investigations are going on through agencies like NIA, etc. So far, security agencies have been able to control such incidents to a great extent," it said.

Kuki Students' Organisation Demands Action

The Kuki Students' Organisation (KSO) in a statement on Monday said it is "deeply shocked and outraged by the continued inaction of the government of India regarding the leaked audio recording of Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh." 'The Wire' report said the KSO had shared a transcript of short excerpts of the purported audio clip in a press release on August 7.

The clashes between the valley-dominant Meitei community and nearly two dozen tribes known as Kukis - a term given by the British in colonial times - who are dominant in some hill areas of Manipur, has killed over 220 people and internally displaced nearly 50,000.

Ten Kuki-Zo MLAs, close to two dozen Kuki-Zo armed groups under the suspension of operations (SoO) agreement, and groups such as the Indigenous Tribal Leaders Forum and the Committee on Tribal Unity, all have demanded a separate administration carved out of Manipur, bringing them on the same commons stage.

"General public are hereby clarified and appealed for not relying on such unfounded contents circulating in social media and news reports and also to refrain from involvement in spreading such false and fabricated information through any media," the Manipur government said in the statement.

During the discussion and voting on demands for grants on the last day of the Manipur assembly on August 12, the Chief Minister had said "violence was perpetrated by some, not all, people", and that the state government has been in peace talks with a section of Thadou, Paite and Hmar tribe leaders.

On August 7 too, the Manipur government in a statement had said the doctored audio was a malicious attempt by certain sections to incite communal violence and to derail the peace process that has been initiated at multiple levels.

"Not every Thadou, Paite, Hmar had a hand in the violence. You have seen, Hmar people spoke so well (in the peace meeting), we had tears, they too had tears, that all this happened due to misunderstandings," Mr Singh had said in the assembly, referring to the August 1 peace meeting between Meitei and the Hmar tribe representatives in Jiribam, where they agreed to work for normalcy nearly two months after ethnic violence that began over a year ago reached the district bordering Assam.

The Manipur assembly in February unanimously passed a resolution asking the Centre to scrap the controversial SoO agreement with some 25 Kuki-Zo insurgent groups. The SoO agreement has not been renewed yet.