New Delhi
Thounaojam Brinda, once a decorated officer of Manipur Police who joined politics some three years back and is still technically a member of the Janata Dal-United party in the state, raised alarm that what is happening in the northeast state can turn into a serious national security crisis. She urged the Union government to invoke the National Register of Citizens to identify all those immigrants, but at this point mostly militants from across the border in Burma, who have infiltrated every strata of the Manipur society. “They collect taxes on highways, have acquired Aadhaar, ensures smooth narco trade across borders, and make arms accessible.”
“What these groups have done will be catastrophic for the future generation of all tribes/people living in the area,” Brinda told The Sunday Guardian. Brinda said drugs, opium, and poppy cultivation are at the heart of the crisis. She pleaded with the government at the Centre “not to shy away from an effective response”, as she expressed the fear that the “Manipur crisis could easily snowball into a sub-continental problem if not attended to immediately”.
Brinda, who as an officer had at one point in time faced a contempt case for her “offensive” remarks on Facebook allegedly undermining and criticising the judiciary after an alleged druglord Lhukhosei Zhou was granted bail by the court in a Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act case, said, “We have to go back deep into the nexus of drug trade across a highly perforated border that Manipur shares with Burma, end the root-cause to deflect the danger it can cause to India’s national security.” Brinda added that the narco-crisis is a problem for the region since 1980s and has proliferated exponentially since then.
She said that the NDPS was enforced in 1985 but the drugs issue and poppy cultivation since the 1980s have been going on unabated in the hilly regions. All government departments, missionaries of the area are aware of the problem.
“But how come even despite the state police destroying all poppy cultivation that they claim annually, drug trade continues unabated?” she asked. That is because, Brinda explained, the probe and procedures are shoddy. “In all the records, there is no clear data on who all are growing, no FIRs are there to explain. It is an ineffective probe,” she added.
“We now see poppy cultivation has violently spread—some districts are completely infested; so who is doing this?” Brinda, who had spent a good part of her career handling the issue, said, “There is a faction of the Kuki that has come from the Burmese side—there is a huge influx of them to the hill districts. They are gaining from the suspension of operation with the militants who are in turn involved in drugs, poppy cartel, and drug cartel.”
The investigation should be why this demand for statehood, where is the money going, how much they are collecting—and all this has a large chunk of militants in the suspension of operation, she added.
“The foreign nationals who came here decades ago are now well settled in Manipur. They are now as much Manipuri as any of us. But those churning the drug trade, those that came later, for them conducting of the NRC is absolutely essential. Conduct the NRC on them and seal the borders. That is the only way to deal with the crisis.”
“How many have infiltrated into police, army, government, no one knows. They are still creeping into our system—what havoc they can create, we are witnessing it now,” said Brinda.