The nearly 700 pages report on Manipur’s ethnic crisis by People’s Union for Civil Liberties, PUCL, has among others, highlighted two cautionary notes for research writing and publishing. One, written and published words tend to live on even after their contents have been proven inaccurate or false. There are always some who would cite and give them new life. Two, in motivated researches, the legal principle of “Audi Alteram Partem” – hearing all parties before making judgments – is often forsaken. The PUCL report is replete with both.
Two examples should illustrate. On page-362, a testimony by an unnamed Meitei journalist claims: “We have a journalists union – All Manipur Working Journalists Union. This union has a decisive role – on how to carry a story, how to kill a story. It operates like Godi media and they are pro-Biren Singh.”
Another adds, there are journalists who refuse these consensual lines, indicating he/she is one such: “I have been warned, threatened, a gun has been put on my head,” adding he was arrested twice, and cases slapped on his organisation. He further indicates his membership with AMWJU is rejected as his organisation is not recognized by the union on the plea only “Private Ltd. companies can run TV channels and digital media.”
Considering these allegations are slanderous, should PUCL not have given AMWJU a chance to explain before publishing?
This columnist is familiar with the background of these issues. For instance, the stipulation of admitting digital media journalists only if their employer organisation is a Pvt Limited Company, is not an independent policy of AMWJU, but leans on a November 30, 2022 order of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, MIB.
The order says only Pvt. Ltd. Companies running “Multi System Operators” can apply for MIB registration. AMWJU used this to deal with the problem of accommodating an exponentially increasing number of journalists in an age anybody with a smartphone can claim to be a journalist.
On the allegation of AMWJU setting consensual standards for news coverage, this is not for all news and happens especially in coverage of factional fights between insurgents. Member journalists sit together to decide how or whether to carry such news and stand together so that none ends up alone to face coercion later. Outrageous as this is, it has to be understood as a coping mechanism in a prolonged conflict situation.
The other red flag is the tendency of perpetuating published ideas even after they have been proven false.
For example, the PUCL report refers to a September 2022 report on the Manipur crisis by the Editors Guild of India, EGI, to claim that declaration of Reserved Forests, RF, and Protected Forests, PF, is weaponised to target a community (page-108 and 320). When EGI made this allegation, a signed clarification had been issued by the then Principal Chief Conservator of Forest, PCCF, S.S. Chhabra, explaining there are no recently declared RF or PF in Manipur. The last RF was declared on January 4, 1990 and the last PF on June 18, 1979. This clarification is ignored by the PUCL report.
On page-300 the report deals with the case of the Churachandpur-Khoupum PF. It claims that 38 original villages in this 499.06 sq. km PF declared in 1966, were set to be evicted as encroachers. The same PCCF clarification had explained this too was untrue.
In 1972 a forest officer “set aside” these 38 original villages though there is no provision for setting aside villages in a PF. This ultra vires “setting aside” was what was sought to be annulled by the PCCF by a November 2022 order, which the PUCL report cites as discriminatory.
This annulling however does not mean the 38 original villages will face eviction, for in a PF, existing villages are allowed to remain where they were. The problem however is the number of villages in this PF has grown from 38 in 1966 to 191 now. The new villages hence can face the prospect of eviction. Poor research rigor also makes the PUCL report confuse the difference between a PF and RF.
No habitation is allowed within RFs. Hence when a forested area is notified as a potential RF and there are claims of villages overlapping with the proposed RF, a settlement officer has to confirm the claims and then either “set them aside” so they are no longer inside the RF, or else acquire them after paying due compensation. By contrast, in a PF, human habitations are allowed within them so the question of “setting aside” does not arise.
The thumb rule is, in RFs no human activities are allowed except those expressly permitted by forest authorities, and in PFs, all activities of existing villages are allowed, except those expressly prohibited by forest authorities. All these too had been clarified but none of it is reflected in the PUCL report.
On the matter of eviction, official figures are revealing. Between October 24, 2015 when the eviction drive began, and April 18, 2023 when the last eviction took place, there have been a total of 413 houses evicted from 24 RFs and PFs. Except for a few, such as K. Songjang in Noney district, the rest are all in the valley districts. Community wise, the evicted houses are: Kuki-59, Meitei-143, Meitei Pangal-137, Naga-38 and Nepali-36. This does not suggest any targeted victimisation that the PUCL report so readily presumes.
Selective use of vocabularies also indicates a motive. For example, one community is “thrown out” of the valley but the other “left the hills” (page-22). Technically they may mean the same, but the bias is apparent. The report also says Meiteis are restricted from buying land in the hills and reciprocally tribals are restricted from buying land in the valley (page-612). This is a sinister half-truth.
The trouble is, activists for whom anti-establishment posturing is vital, tend to be prone to wokeness, absorbing only what endorse their preconceived views and cancelling those that challenge them. The PUCL report, rather than heal has opened old wounds afresh.
This article was first published in The New Indian Express. The original can be read HERE
Editor, Imphal Review of Arts and Politics and author
