Guwahati: Fourteen civil society organisations (CSOs) and community leaders from Manipur have petitioned the Centre to defer the ongoing Census exercise and complete an updated National Register of Citizens (NRC) before any delimitation exercise is carried out in the state.
The group — comprising the 14 CSO Kangleipak along with community leaders of the Kabui Union Manipur, Kom Union Manipur, Rongmei Naga Manipur, Meitei Pangal Manipur and a representative of IDP Manipur — said it had submitted representations to the Prime Minister’s Office, the Home Minister, the Registrar General of India (RGI) and the Ministry of Home Affairs.
The group said the representations sought identification of Indian nationals ahead of delimitation. In a statement issued in New Delhi on Tuesday, it said there was a wide gap between what the people of Manipur want and how the issue has been represented to central bureaucrats and leaders responsible for taking a decision.
The group said updating the NRC was a common demand across Manipur and that the Union government should work with the state’s people to protect its political integrity for what it termed “original Indian citizens”.
The CSOs and community leaders have demanded that citizen identification be linked to the year 1951. They cited the Manipur Constitution Act, enacted before the state’s merger with the Indian Union, which listed villages through an official gazette. The same village and population data was used for Manipur’s first democratic election, in which 53 members were elected representing all communities.
The group also pointed to the entry and exit pass system maintained by the princely state of Manipur for foreigners. It was abolished on November 18, 1950, by then Chief Commissioner Himmat Singh, following Manipur’s merger into the Dominion of India.
According to the statement, Manipur’s first Census and NRC exercise was conducted in 1951 after the entry-exit pass system was scrapped and used the 1948 village list for its publication. The state remained a single district until 1969, when it was reorganised into five districts and 25 sub-divisions, with 1,947 villages recorded at the time.
The statement said the Manipur government froze administrative boundaries — districts, tehsils and villages — from March 31, 2027. It noted that the number of villages increased from 1,866 in the 1961 Census to 2,540 in the 2011 Census.
District-wise, the increase was recorded as follows: Chandel, from 244 to 430; Churachandpur, from 290 to 599; Tamenglong, from 163 to 175; Ukhrul, from 223 to 213; Bishnupur, from 61 to 48; Thoubal, from 113 to 87; Imphal West, from 142 to 115; and Imphal East, from 262 to 203. The group added that several hamlets and new villages remained under application for recognition as of 2027.
The group linked the rise in villages, particularly in Churachandpur and Chandel, to villages recognised under the Hill Area Committee, constituted under Article 371C of the Constitution, and the Scheduled Tribes order of 1950.
The Scheduled Tribes for Manipur are defined under Part X of the Constitution (Scheduled Tribes) Order, 1950, recognising 34 distinct tribal communities. The list has been amended several times by Parliament under Article 342 of the Constitution, with the most recent addition being the Mate community in 2012. The amendment was notified on January 8, 2012, and published in the official gazette the following day.
The group also cited the case of a Manipur-cadre IAS officer who was suspended by the state government on June 27, 2011, along with another official, for issuing unauthorised orders recognising 96 villages in the state’s hill districts without competent authority to do so.
The statement said Manipur shares a porous border with Myanmar and that the entry-exit pass system abolished in 1950 was the only safeguard against unchecked entry of foreign nationals. Since then, it claimed, a number of individuals had migrated into Manipur, settled there and gone on to access various political and constitutional rights.
The CSOs and community leaders urged the state and central governments to defer the present Census exercise and complete the NRC update before delimitation. They also called on the Government of Manipur and the Government of India to convene tripartite talks with various stakeholders on implementation of the NRC ahead of any delimitation exercise, given that Manipur is home to indigenous, native and more recently settled communities.
The statement referred to a 2025 law that it said empowers states to detect and deport immigrants. The group welcomed what it described as constitutional provisions to protect the interests of “original Indian citizens”.
It reiterated the need to fix a base year for identification, saying this was necessary to ensure political power did not pass to non-original inhabitants and that certain facilities should remain limited to original Indian citizens.
The group further urged the Kuki Zo Council and Saikot MLA Paolienlal Haokip to examine Census data from 1951 to 2011, saying this would clarify why various CSOs and community leaders were demanding postponement of Census 2027 and completion of the NRC update before delimitation.