Killing of 2 Meitei teens: CBI to probe murders amid protests in Imphal
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Guwahati: Thousands of students in Imphal took to the streets on Tuesday, 26 September, staging a demonstration seeking justice for the two Meitei students, who went missing on 6 July during the peak of ethnic violence, and now seem to have been killed as indicated by the photographs that surfaced online on Monday.
Photos of the deceased bodies of the missing teenagers surfaced late on Monday after the state reinstated mobile internet, the latest victims in the five-month-long ethnic violence in Manipur.
The images soon went viral on social media, leading to protests by students in the state.
The two teenagers, who ended up in the area controlled by the Kukis, were allegedly killed by suspected militants belonging to the community.
In the images that emerged on the internet, one shows the dead bodies of the two students while the other one shows them sitting in fear with two armed men in the background.
The man’s head appeared to be missing in the photograph and the woman’s face is not visible. The two are wearing the same clothes as seen in the first photograph. Their faces are not visible in the second photograph.
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According to the police officers in Manipur, the last cellphone location of the two Meitei students was traced in Lamdan of Churachandpur district.
While the murder investigation has been transferred to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), Manipur police said their initial probe revealed that the missing 20-year-old man and 17-year-old girl may have eloped on July 6, but got trapped in an area dominated by the Kuki community while fleeing, after which they were allegedly abducted and murdered, reports The Hindustan Times.
The girl’s father has reportedly filed a complaint against Phijam Hemanjit Singh (20) for abducting his daughter.
The police investigation found that a new SIM card was inserted in the man’s mobile phone that was activated in Lamdan, a Kuki-dominated area, on July 7, a day after the two went missing.
A CBI team led by special director Ajay Bhatnagar will visit Imphal on Wednesday to investigate the case.
The state government suspended mobile internet and data services through VPN for five days till 7.45 pm on 1 October 2023.
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An order issued by joint secretary (home) Mayengbam Veto Singh (on behalf of governor Anusuiya Uikey) mentioned that the move was taken “in view of prevailing law and order situation in the state” and to prevent “spread of disinformation, false rumours and other types of violent activities through social media platforms”.
The Manipur government on Tuesday said that all the government, aided and private unaided schools will be closed till Friday in view of the prevailing law and order situation in the state.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar also reacted to the incident on Tuesday saying that efforts are on in Manipur by the state and the central governments to find a way by which a sense of normalcy returns and there is adequate law-and-order enforcement.
Clashes broke out in Manipur first on May 3 in Churachandpur town after the protests by the Kuki and Meitei communities against the High Court's order asking the state government to consider the inclusion of the Meitei community in the category of Scheduled Tribes (ST).
Violence quickly consumed the state claiming the lives of more than 170 people and displacing another 50, 000, virtually dividing the state between the dominant Meitei community and the tribal Kuki group.
Meitei community lives in the plains and constitutes 53% of the state’s population, while the tribal Kuki group, which lives in the hill districts, makes up 16% of the state.
