Manipur's Unending War: Children Die in Their Sleep as India's Forgotten Ethnic Conflict Enters Its Fourth Year

At approximately 1:00 a.m. on April 7, 2026, a rocket-like projectile struck a house in Tronglaobi Awang Leikai, a village in Moirang along the hill-valley boundary in Manipur's Bishnupur district. Inside were a five-year-old boy, his infant sister, and their mother. The children's father, a Border Security Force personnel, was posted outside the state [1]. Both children died during treatment at a hospital in Imphal. Their mother, Binita, sustained splinter injuries and remains hospitalized [2].

The projectile was fired from nearby hill areas—territory predominantly inhabited by the Kuki-Zo tribal community. Within hours, a mob of several hundred people converged on a CRPF camp approximately 200 meters from the attack site, accusing security forces of failing to prevent the strike. CRPF personnel opened fire. At least two civilians were killed and more than 20 injured, according to police officials, though some reports put the death toll at three [3][4]. The Manipur government suspended internet services across five districts for three days [5].

This was not an isolated incident. It was the latest escalation in an ethnic conflict that has consumed India's northeastern state of Manipur since May 3, 2023, killing more than 260 people, displacing over 60,000, and burning nearly 5,000 homes [6][7].

The Roots: Scheduled Tribe Status and the Court Order That Lit the Fuse

The immediate trigger for the 2023 violence was a Manipur High Court order dated March 27, 2023, directing the state government to consider including the Meitei community in the Scheduled Tribes (ST) list [8]. The Meitei—a predominantly Hindu community comprising roughly 53% of Manipur's population but concentrated in the Imphal Valley, which constitutes about 10% of the state's land area—had sought ST status through the Scheduled Tribes Demand Committee of Manipur (STDCM) since 2012 [9].

The Meitei case rests on several arguments: that they were recognized as a tribe before Manipur's merger with India in 1949; that they face demographic and cultural pressures from migration; and that ST status would provide constitutional safeguards to preserve their identity and secure land rights in the hill areas, where current protections bar non-tribals from purchasing land [9][10].

The existing Scheduled Tribe communities—primarily Kuki-Zo and Naga groups who inhabit the surrounding hills—viewed the court order as an existential threat. If the Meitei, who already dominate the state's political and economic institutions, gained ST status, tribal groups feared losing reserved seats, educational quotas, and protections over hill land [8]. The Tribal Students Union of Manipur organized a protest march on May 3, 2023, which spiraled into widespread violence [6].

In February 2024, the Manipur High Court reversed course, deleting the directive from its earlier judgment and citing procedural lapses [11]. By then, the damage had been done.

The Toll: Deaths, Displacement, and Destruction

Official government figures, as of late 2024, placed the death toll at 258, with over 1,000 injured and 32 people still missing [6]. Independent organizations including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have suggested these figures undercount the actual toll [7][12].

The destruction of property has been extensive. Government data records 4,786 houses burned and 386 religious structures vandalized, including both temples and churches [6]. The violence has followed an ethnic geography: Meitei homes and temples destroyed in the hills, Kuki-Zo homes and churches destroyed in the valley, with a de facto ethnic partition hardening along the hill-valley boundary.

Displacement remains a defining feature of the crisis. Approximately 60,000 people were displaced in the initial months of violence. As of early 2026, roughly 41,500 remain without permanent homes, with many still living in 281 relief camps across the state [13][14].

Source: India Today NE / Amnesty International

Data as of Apr 7, 2026CSV

Disaggregated data by ethnicity remains incomplete and contested. Both communities accuse the other of inflating their own casualties and minimizing the other's. The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), which tracks political violence globally, documented that Manipur accounted for 77% of all political violence events in India's northeast in 2023 [15].

Government Response: Budgets, Rehabilitation, and the Question of Adequacy

The financial response has escalated over three fiscal years. The central government provided a special package of ₹2,198 crore to Manipur in the current financial year, covering security-related expenditure, deployment costs for Central Paramilitary Forces, and rehabilitation of displaced families [14]. State-level budget allocations for internally displaced persons have risen from ₹523 crore in 2024-25, to ₹573 crore in 2025-26, to ₹734 crore in the 2026-27 budget [16][17].

Source: Manipur State Budget / India Today NE

Data as of Mar 9, 2026CSV

The Congress party has called the latest allocation inadequate, given the scale of displacement [18]. Amnesty International, marking the second anniversary of the violence in May 2025, called on authorities to "urgently rehabilitate thousands displaced" and noted that resettlement progress had been slow [7].

As of December 2025, the Manipur government had resettled approximately 10,000 displaced persons under its ₹523 crore resettlement drive, with plans to rehabilitate 40,000 by March 2026 [19][20]. Those targets were not met. The gap between budget allocation and actual resettlement suggests both bureaucratic and security obstacles—many displaced families cannot return to their original homes because those areas are now controlled by the opposing ethnic group.

Political Transition: From Biren Singh to Khemchand Singh

A political shift occurred alongside the ongoing crisis. Chief Minister N. Biren Singh, a Meitei leader from the BJP who had been accused by Kuki groups and opposition parties of partisanship, resigned on February 9, 2025, facing the threat of a no-confidence motion [21]. President's Rule was imposed for nearly a year.

On February 4, 2026, President's Rule was revoked and Yumnam Khemchand Singh, also of the BJP, was sworn in as Chief Minister. In a departure from the Biren Singh era, the new government included Kuki and Naga MLAs as deputy chief ministers—a deliberate gesture toward inclusivity [22]. Whether this structural change translates into substantive policy shifts remains an open question. The April 7 attack and its aftermath occurred just two months into the new administration.

Khemchand Singh ordered a National Investigation Agency (NIA) probe into the children's deaths and convened an emergency meeting with CRPF, Assam Rifles, BSF, and Rapid Action Force officials [2][5].

Security Failures and the Buffer Zone Problem

The attack in Bishnupur occurred near a heavily guarded buffer zone—a no-man's land established by security forces between Meitei-majority valley areas and Kuki-Zo hill territory [23]. The proximity of the strike to a CRPF camp, barely 200 meters away, raised immediate questions about surveillance and response capabilities.

Central forces deployed in Manipur include the CRPF, Assam Rifles, BSF, Rapid Action Force, and Indian Army units. Approximately 10,000 army, paramilitary, and Central Armed Police Forces personnel were deployed in the initial months of the conflict in 2023 [6]. The government has since increased this presence, though exact current figures are not publicly available.

Critics from the Meitei community accuse security forces of failing to prevent attacks from the hills. Critics from the Kuki-Zo community accuse security forces—particularly state police—of siding with the Meitei. The CRPF firing on protesters on April 7 will deepen both sets of grievances.

Arms, Militias, and the Impunity Problem

The conflict has been waged with increasingly sophisticated weapons. Security forces have recovered military-grade arms including INSAS rifles—standard Indian military issue—traced back to Manipur Police armories that were looted during the early days of the conflict [24]. The Print reported that looted weapons have been sold beyond the valley and across international borders, with INSAS rifles fetching between ₹1.5 lakh and ₹3 lakh on the black market [24].

On the Meitei side, two groups have emerged as armed actors: the Arambai Tenggol and Meitei Leepun (also called Meitei Lippun). The Arambai Tenggol, founded in 2020 as a cultural organization by Manipur's titular king Leishemba Sanajaoba, transformed into an armed militia during the conflict. Its six-point charter demands implementation of the National Register of Citizens, revocation of ceasefire agreements with Kuki-Zo armed groups, and deletion of Kukis from the Scheduled Tribes list [25][26].

Neither the Arambai Tenggol nor Meitei Leepun has been formally banned by the Indian government, despite documented involvement in violence. Amnesty International found at least 32 reported incidents of gender-based violence by members of these groups against ethnic tribal communities [12]. The Wire reported that no Arambai Tenggol leader has been arrested, and neither the central BJP government nor Manipur state officials have condemned the group's violence [25].

On the Kuki-Zo side, multiple armed groups operate in the hills, some under Suspension of Operations (SoO) agreements with the Indian government—ceasefire deals that the Meitei community has demanded be revoked. Other groups, including factions of the PLA, PREPAK, KCP, and KYKL, have also been active [27].

The asymmetry in enforcement—with hill-based Kuki groups designated as insurgents under existing frameworks while valley-based Meitei militias operate without formal prohibition—is one of the most contentious aspects of the conflict.

The Justice Deficit: FIRs, Prosecutions, and the Viral Video Case

The Supreme Court of India has criticized Manipur police for delays in filing First Information Reports (FIRs) and investigating cases of violence, calling the situation an "absolute breakdown of law and order" [12][28].

Amnesty International documented at least three instances since November 2023 of tribal community members facing barriers in getting complaints officially registered by Manipur police [12]. While exact totals of FIRs filed by each community are not publicly consolidated, the pattern described by multiple organizations points to a prosecution rate that is negligible relative to the scale of documented crimes.

The most internationally prominent case involves two Kuki women who were paraded naked and sexually assaulted by a mob on May 4, 2023—a day after the violence began. A 26-second video of the attack went viral in July 2023, provoking condemnation from the United States and prompting Prime Minister Narendra Modi to break his silence on the Manipur crisis after 77 days [29][30].

The legal history of this case illustrates the obstacles to accountability. The victims' families filed a complaint on May 18, 2023, but police took over a month to transfer it to the correct jurisdiction. The victims themselves told The Wire that Manipur Police were present at the scene but did not intervene—a police vehicle was parked on the roadside as the assault occurred [31]. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) eventually took over the case, finding the Manipur police complicit [12]. Six arrests were made, but more than a year later, formal charges against police officers or members of Meitei vigilante groups had not been filed [12].

Former Chief Minister Biren Singh dismissed calls for accountability as "attempts to defame the BJP government and Prime Minister Narendra Modi" and referred to the Kuki tribal community as "illegal immigrants," "terrorists," and "drug peddlers" [12].

Comparing Delhi's Response: Manipur in Historical Context

India has faced ethnic and communal violence before. In the 1983 Nellie massacre in Assam, an estimated 2,000 people were killed in a single day. In the 2002 Gujarat riots, over 1,000 people died. In the 2012 Bodo-Muslim clashes in Assam, approximately 400,000 people were displaced [6].

In each of those cases, the central government's response differed. The 2002 Gujarat violence prompted army deployment, though critics argued it came too late and that the state government under then-Chief Minister Narendra Modi was complicit. In Manipur, the central government airlifted Rapid Action Force companies and deployed roughly 10,000 security personnel, but critics—including Human Rights Watch—noted the delay. HRW's July 2023 statement was titled "Indian Government Finally Responds to Violence in Manipur," published nearly three months after the conflict began [32].

The Supreme Court, responding to petitions seeking military deployment, noted it had not in over 70 years directed the armed forces to deploy—highlighting the constitutional constraint of civilian control over military operations [33]. The imposition of President's Rule in February 2025, nearly two years into the crisis, was the most drastic central intervention, but it came long after the violence had become entrenched.

The International Crisis Group, in its analysis of the conflict, has pointed to the need for a political settlement rather than purely security-based responses, noting that the ethnic partition along the hill-valley boundary has become self-reinforcing [34].

What Comes Next

Three years into the Manipur crisis, the structural conditions that produced the violence remain unresolved. The Meitei demand for Scheduled Tribe status has been legally rejected but not politically settled. Tens of thousands remain displaced. Armed groups on both sides operate with varying degrees of impunity. Weapons looted from state armories circulate freely.

The April 7 killing of two children—and the subsequent killing of protesters by the very security forces meant to protect them—captures the crisis in miniature: civilians trapped between armed actors, with the state unable or unwilling to provide either security or justice.

Chief Minister Khemchand Singh's government faces a test that his predecessor failed. The NIA probe he has ordered into the children's deaths will be watched closely, but the real measure will be whether his administration can break the pattern of impunity that has allowed this conflict to persist—and whether Delhi treats Manipur's crisis with the urgency it demands.