Guwahati/September 10, 2023 (SPN) | The World Meetei Council (WMC) has identified the unequal constitutional status of the Meeteis as the root cause of the ongoing crisis in Manipur. They have called upon Prime Minister Narendra Modi to rectify this issue by promptly including the Meetei community in the Scheduled Tribe list.
The WMC conducted a meeting in Guwahati on September 8, during which they discussed the violent crisis that has engulfed Manipur. They expressed that, since the inception of the Indian Constitution, the Meeteis have been unjustly treated as strangers or second-class citizens within their own state.
Regrettably, this has occurred with the knowledge of Meetei leaders who have not taken governance action to rectify this situation.
The statement issued by the World Meetei Council emphasized that the current violence could have been prevented if the Meeteis had been granted their rightful citizenship rights in Manipur.
WMC highlighted the absurdity that an immigrant Chin-Kuki individual can arrive in Manipur and immediately become a rightful citizen under the Scheduled Tribe category, while Meeteis have been deprived of this status due to the Indian and Manipur governments’ constitutional disposition.
The World Meetei Council also condemned the immigrant Chin-Kuki population for demanding more at the expense of the indigenous people and called this unacceptable.
WMC urged the central government to address the root cause of this concerning trend for the greater good of the nation, emphasizing that lasting peace cannot be achieved without justice for the Meetei community.