‘Militant’ bodies airlifted to Manipur after post-mortem in Assam

Imphal/Silchar : The bodies of all ten “militants” killed in an encounter with the security personnel in Manipur's Jiribam district on November 11 were brought back to Churachandpur district by helicopter on Saturday from Assam’s Silchar Medical College and Hospital (SMCH) after conducting post-mortem examination, officials said.

All tribal organisations in Manipur including the Indigenous Tribal Leaders' Forum (ITLF), Kuki-Zo Council and Hmar Students' Association have been claiming that all ten are “Hmar Village Volunteers” were engaged to protect the villagers.

A tribal leader said that the “martyrs bodies” were brought by helicopter by the government despite the ITLF decision to bring the bodies by road.

The ITLF, the apex body of the Kuki-Zo tribals in Manipur, held an urgent meeting on Saturday afternoon and decided that the bodies of the “martyrs” would not be claimed at the moment because no post-mortem documents were brought with the bodies.

“Our martyrs’ bodies would be placed in the district hospital morgue until post-mortem reports are available.

An expert in this field would carefully review the post-mortem documents for any inconsistencies as soon as they become available,” a statement from the tribal body said.

It said that the ITLF legal cell would take up all legal matters in this regard and added that the Joint Philanthropic Organisation (JPO) would collaborate with the Hmar Inpui to plan the burial program for “ten martyrs”.

In Silchar (Assam), Assam Police resorted to a lathi-charge outside the SMCH on Saturday as family members of 10 slain ‘militants’ clashed with the police demanding that the bodies be handed over to them.

The family members of the ten ‘militants’ killed in an encounter with the CRPF personnel on November 11 in Manipur’s Jiribam district, have been camping outside the medical college seeking that the bodies be handed over to them.

Police officials initially tried to convince them that the bodies would be handed over to Manipur Police as per norms but the family members refused to accept the proposal and clashed with the police personnel and also pelted stones injuring several persons, including four journalists.

The United Meitei-Pangal Committee (UMPC), an amalgamation of all Meitei-Pangal (Muslims) Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in the region, condemned the killings of three children and three women in Jiribam District.

The current situation must be resolved through political dialogue, peacebuilding, and the delivery of justice to the victims and their families, the IMPC said in a statement.