AIZAWL: Mizoram Rajya Sabha member K Vanlalvena has urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to form a joint parliamentary team to probe into the recent ethnic violence in neighbouring Manipur.
In a letter written to the Prime Minister, Vanlalvena urged that the joint parliamentary team, which should include MPs from Christian minorities, be formed to carry out an independent investigation of the entire sequences leading to the violent clashes.
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“I request that a joint parliamentary team be formed in which Christian MPs are also included and sent to the affected areas to carry out an independent investigation on the entire sequence of events so that the truth may be unearthed and justice is delivered,” the Mizoram MP said in his letter .
Although the situation in Manipur is limping back to normal, there is a strong possibility of recurrence of such violence unless there is an honest and sincere effort to analyse the sequence of events and the pattern of violence committed by the perpetrators, he said.
Vanlalvena alleged that more than 42 churches, including 6 belonging to the Meitei Christians, were burned down besides houses, shops and vehicles belonging to the tribal community during the mob violence in Imphal, Manipur.
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“It is evident that the seemingly random act of violence was not a spontaneous burst of outrage by one community against another but instead it was a calculated and pre-meditated move to specifically target the Christian community, including the local Meitei Christians, which shook one of the main foundations of our Constitution- ‘Secularism,'” he said.
He said that violence and arson occurred at more than 49 tribal habitations as well as in a sizeable number of towns and localities dominated by majority Meiteis.
The Mizoram also alleged that four civilians, including two women, were gunned down by security forces in Churachandpur town on May 5 when the demonstrators protested against the move to evacuate displaced non-tribal people to Imphal.
The protesters had demanded that the displaced tribal people, who were lodging at several military bases in Imphal should also be evacuated to safer places in the hills area, he said.
Meanwhile, the situation across the violence-hit neighbouring state is improving with no fresh reports of violent clashes and untoward incidents in the past four days, officials said.
Curfew has also been relaxed in all the 11 districts where it was clamped, they said.
Manipur chief minister N Biren Singh on Monday had told reporters that 60 people were killed and 231 others injured in the ethnic violence, that rocked the northeastern state for the past few days.
More than 1700 houses, including religious places, have also been razed to the ground, he had said.