For those that are unaware, ethnic violence has affected the state of Manipur in India for about the past three months.
Manipur has been in the grip of ethnic violence resulting in the deaths of over 150 persons, displacement of tens of thousands of people and horrific crimes against women.
It has been taking place between the majority Meitei community and the minority Kuki community.
In an insane twist, the prime minister until very recently had been completely mum about these grotesque riots. Why? Because the state is under BJP rule and the chief minister, Biren Singh, has himself stoked this violence by making statements like this:
Just a month before the May incidents, he had told the RSS paper, Organiser, that, “The indigenous people of the state have been reduced to the status of second class citizens after the foreigner Kuki immigrants took control of the social, political and economic affairs”. Here he echoes a longstanding propaganda of the RSS about illegal immigrants flooding Assam and the North East.
What forced Modi to speak publicly about this issue was something terrible that happened to two Kuki women.
Mention of sexual assault
It was only when the chilling video showing two women being paraded naked by armed Meitei men became viral on social media on the eve of the parliament session that Narendra Modi was compelled to speak.
True to his form, after expressing token sorrow, he instantly trivialised the incident and diverted attention away from it to attack his opposition parties instead:
But he immediately sought to divert and trivialise the issue by talking about how such crimes against women must be firmly put down in states like Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Manipur. This was the cue for BJP leaders and the party’s IT cell to take up the refrain of how women are being abused and assaulted in states run by the opposition parties like Rajasthan, West Bengal and Chhattisgarh.
As a side note, Modi was welcomed with open arms during his US visit while these riots were going on:
