The Manipur Police have filed a criminal case against the Assam Rifles, for "obstruction of duty" and "criminal intimidation" in an unprecedented action. Assam Rifles is known as the nation's oldest paramilitary force.
The 9th battalion of the Assam Rifles has been charged by the police with the "arrogant act" of "giving a chance to the accused Kuki militants to escape freely to a safe zone."
The BJP State leadership informed Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a memo dated August 7 that the “Assam Rifles has been charged by the public for their biased role in tackling the situation by favoring and supporting one side only.”
They demanded the army leave Manipur permanently. The Army has operational control over the Assam Rifles, which are also stationed along the Myanmar border.
The first information report (FIR) follows the incident at Kwakta on August 5 in the Meitei-dominated Bishnupur area, where a father-and-son team and another person were hacked to death while sleeping by armed thugs who are believed to be Kuki community members who came from the neighboring Churachandpur district.
After the killings, the Manipur Police alleged that the Assam Rifles unit prevented their team from conducting a search operation to find the alleged attackers who may have been hiding in the vicinity. It said that the Assam Rifles blocked their path with armored vehicles. The same day, a video of the argument went viral.
In a statement released late on Tuesday, the Army stated that some adversarial elements had made desperate, repeated, and unsuccessful attempts to cast doubt on the role, integrity, and intention of the Central security forces, particularly the Assam Rifles, who have been working tirelessly since May 3 to save lives and restore peace in Manipur.
“It needs to be understood that due to the complex nature of the situation on the ground in Manipur, occasional differences at tactical level do occur between various security forces. However, all such misunderstandings at the functional level are immediately addressed through the joint mechanism to synergise the efforts for restoration of peace and normalcy in Manipur,” it added.
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