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Manipur unrest


FEMINIST ICONS OR VIOLENT VIGILANTES? THE CONTENTIOUS ROLE OF MEIRA PAIBIS IN
MANIPUR’S CONFLICT


CELEBRATED FOR LONG AS THE TORCHBEARERS OF MANIPUR, MEITEI WOMEN GROUPS NOW
STAND ACCUSED OF BLOCKING THE ARMY AND EGGING ON VIOLENCE AGAINST KUKI-ZO WOMEN.

Tora Agarwala
Aug 04, 2023 · 06:30 am
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In July, hundreds of Meira Paibis diverted traffic for a rally in Imphal to
condole the death of a 19-year-old Meitei student, allegedly killed by Kuki
mobs. | Tora Agarwala

On an overcast July afternoon, a line of military vehicles piled up on a highway
in Manipur’s Bishnupur district. For hours, the commanding officer, seated in
the vehicle leading the convoy, had been trying to get through to the other
side. Blocking his way was a group of stick-wielding, resolute-faced women,
holding his gaze, watching his every move.

The impasse continued till one woman broke away from the crowd, and angrily
shouted at the officer: “We are hungry now, get out from here. Niklo yahaan se.”

The officer, his expression stolid behind his sunglasses, observed them in
silence for a few minutes, then revved up his car. The vehicles behind him
followed suit. “They are defeating their own cause,” he said, before making a
U-turn.

On this stretch of National Highway 2, the only road that connects the
Meitei-dominated Imphal valley to the Kuki-Zo hills of Churachandpur, it is the
Meira Paibis – the women torch-bearers of Manipur – who are in charge.

Every passing vehicle – civilian or military – is stopped and inspected by the
group of women. Even those coming in and out of the district hospital, a few
hundred metres from the site of the blockade, cannot bypass their hawk-eyed
scrutiny.

“We trust no one,” said Thiyam Jovia, a 35-year-old housewife who is a part of
the group.

While the initial searches were for “Kuki militants”, whom they blame for
starting the violence on May 3, much of their ire is now reserved for the Indian
Army and paramilitary forces like the Assam Rifles.

“We are watching the news… these army forces are not with the Meiteis,” said
Jovia. “They have betrayed us, they are helping the other side.”

It is a sentiment that echoes through the Meitei-dominated Imphal Valley that
for three months now, has been at war with the Kuki-Zos, the ethnically-related
tribal communities that live primarily in the hills south of the valley. In this
battle, hundreds of women like Jovia are out on the highways during the day, and
patrolling the streets of their localities by night. They are the first line of
defence for their community, a role they take to heart.

“We Meira Paibis are not afraid of anything,” said Leibak Leima. On a July
evening, the 65-year-old was the first to reach her Imphal locality’s all-women
night vigil. In a small shed by the side of the road, she and her neighbours sat
well past midnight to guard their leikai, or locality as it is called in Meitei.
“Give us guns, and we will be ready to fight,” she said. “In difficult
situations, do not underestimate the strength of a Meitei woman.”

That is borne out by history. From colonial forces to the mighty Indian state,
the Meira Paibis have taken on many powers.

In the early 1900s, they successfully got the British to retract an exploitative
colonial labour policy. Three decades later, they rose up against the maharaja’s
oppressive economic regime in the erstwhile kingdom of Kangleipak. These revolts
are famously known as Nupi Laan, or the Women’s War.

In the 2000s, when the insurgency was at its peak in the state, as were alleged
instances of human rights violations by the state then completely under the
Armed Forces Special Powers Act, their iconic protest against sexual violence
gave them legend-like status.

However, in the divisive ethnic war that has engulfed Manipur for three months
now, the role of the women icons has become contentious. The Indian Army has
called out the Meira Paibis for disrupting peace-making efforts. On some
occasions, the security forces alleged, they have shielded armed insurgents,
blocked highways disrupting passage of food and other essential supplies to
different parts of the state. On Thursday, a group of Meira Paibis clashed with
security forces as they attempted to storm a proposed burial site for Kuki-Zo
victims of the ethnic violence.

Most disturbingly, throughout this conflict, Meira Paibis have been accused of
participating in violence against women.

In Manipur last month, Scroll met four Kuki-Zo women, who recounted in great
detail the brutal assaults they had suffered at the hands of mobs. In two cases,
the women told Scroll that Meitei women were part of the mob, egging the men on
to hurt them. In one case, a 19-year-old alleged that the women themselves –
dressed in traditional phaneks – beat her up. In a police complaint, the woman
identified the assaulters as Meira Paibis.

Scroll spoke to several Meitei women about their participation in the conflict –
and the disquiet expressed about their role.

A group of Meira Paibis block the security forces' path in Bishnupur.


A DECENTRALISED NETWORK

On a Tuesday morning, a 40-year-old government school teacher in Imphal’s Uripok
along with hundreds of women in her locality diverted traffic from the road for
a rally to condole the death of a 19-year-old Meitei student – allegedly killed
by Kukis a few days earlier.

Her traditional phanek tied to her waist, a paste of sandalwood smeared on her
cheeks, she was ready for a long day ahead. For the last three months, she said,
she has played multiple roles: wife to her husband, mother to her two children,
teacher to her students – and most importantly, a “protector to my community”.

Yes, it was tiring, she said – “but I am ready to sacrifice my time. I want to
be here.”

Critics may argue that she has little choice.

As an adult married woman, the 40-year-old is a Meira Paibi by default, and
thereby, bound by the unwritten rules of Meitei society, where women have to
rally together in difficult times.

While it is married women who automatically become members of Meira Paibi
groups, younger, unmarried women can also get involved.

An Imphal-based academic, a Meitei woman, explained: “A woman’s participation in
Meira Paibi activity is mandatory.’’

Anything less, she said, was frowned upon, especially in times of conflict.

She, too, has been out on the streets, taking turns with two other women members
in her house. The duty roster drawn up by her locality’s Meira Paibi group makes
no distinction: by profession or age.

“It does not matter if you are a professor, an IAS officer or a doctor – in
tough times, you have to stand with your community,” she said.

As the Meira Paibis did, during the four-month long protests for the enforcement
of the Inner Line Permit regime in the state in 2015, or against the human
rights violations when the state was under AFSPA.

The Meira Paibis had first banded together to fight social evils of alcoholism
and drug addiction in the 1980s – back then they were known as “nisabandis”.

The movement soon dovetailed into protests against the Indian state.

Almost 20 years ago, Ema Lourembam Nganbi had, along with 12 other mothers or
“Emas”, stripped naked in front of the historic Kangla Fort, the then
headquarters of the Assam Rifles, to protest the brutal killing and rape of
suspected insurgent Thangjam Manorama.

Then in her fifties, standing naked in front of the fort’s gate, Nganbi had
shouted in English: “Rape us, kill us.” The men in uniform awkwardly looked
away, she recalled. The episode went on to become a watershed moment in
Manipur’s long fight against the AFSPA.

“How can I ever forget that day?” Nganbi said, when Scroll met her at a blockade
in Bishnupur district. “It was something we had to do. AFSPA had made too many
widows, killed too many of our innocent men, raped our women. Manorama, Chanu
Rose…” – she counted them on her fingers – “Do you expect us to trust the forces
after all this?”

Nganbi said that the iconic protest “was not for Meitei women alone, but women
across all the 30-plus tribes of Manipur”, adding that Meira Paibis fight for
both women and community.

What then does she feel about the several damning allegations against Meira
Paibis? Nganbi said, “If they [alleged perpetrators] are in the wrong, [police]
investigation will find it.” Then, echoing her community’s view, she added: “But
remember… in this war, Meiteis did not attack the Kukis first; they [Kukis]
started it. We are innocent.”

Ema Lourembam Nganbi, who was part of the iconic 2004 protest against the Assam
Rifles, at the Bishnupur blockade.


A STREAK OF VIGILANTISM

The Meira Paibis, as we know them today, “came into existence to stop atrocities
of the security forces committed against innocent civilians”, academic L Basanti
Devi wrote in her 2021 article Encountering the State in Manipur: A Political
History of Women in Public Space.

In more recent times, with the insurgency on the decline, the women have assumed
a more vigilante role, playing referee on a range of domestic issues, from land
disputes to lovers’ tiffs.

Today, every leikai (colony) in Imphal is represented by a local unit of the
Meira Paibis. The leikai is the first unit of organisation, and every Meira
Paibi’s primary allegiance is to the person heading the leikai.

It is the leikai leader, often the oldest woman in the area, who calls for women
to gather, usually by hitting an electric pole with a stick or a stone.

The sound, the Imphal-based academic said, is a signal to the women in the
neighbourhood to “drop whatever they are doing”, and come out. In the last three
months, she said, the pole in her locality has clanged “innumerable” times,
especially in the first few weeks of the conflict.

“It has been especially terrible to hear the sound these days – the situation is
so tense that you know they can’t be calling you out for anything good,” she
said.

Still, she said, it is natural for women like her to want to help. “This is what
our mothers and grandmothers have been doing for years. So why shouldn’t we?”
she asked.

Moreover, she added, families who don’t send out women are charged a fine. More
than the money, it is the shame associated with being the odd one out. “It will
be definitely frowned upon if you don’t turn up,” she said.. “But to be honest,
there are no families who do not want to send their women out… at least in my
locality.”

A Meitei woman activist in Imphal – not actively involved with the Meira Paibis
– said that sometimes the Meira Paibis’ actions tend to border on vigilantism.

She recalled how a group of women arrived at her doorstep raising money to buy
arms last month. “I refused initially but then ultimately had to give in,” she
said. “If I don’t, I will get into trouble, my family will get into trouble.”

Meira Paibis at a blockade in Bishnupur.


NOT IMMUNE TO PRESSURES

Without a unified central command, hundreds of leikai-level groups dot the
landscape of the Imphal valley, making the Meira Paibis a part of an amorphous
decentralised network.

The movement is not immune to outside pressures, either. It is quite common for
the state’s powerful civil society groups, often backed by politicians, to call
the shots in local Meira Paibi units.

According to the Meitei activist, different groups can use their influence over
the Meira Paibis to do their bidding. “Unfortunately, many get brainwashed, and
easily influenced by the locality leaders,” she said.

To illustrate this, many people Scroll spoke to in Imphal referred to the
incident on June 30 when Chief Minister Biren Singh was supposedly headed to Raj
Bhavan to hand over his resignation. He was waylaid by hundreds of Meitei women,
some of whom tore up his resignation letter. He ultimately did not resign.

“You would think the women are making the decisions – when it is actually the
men who are controlling them,” said the Meitei activist, suggesting that the
protest was not entirely organic. “Our women have incredible courage, they
participate in every single struggle… that is why they are put on the front
line. But, unfortunately, women are used as pawns in the game, while men remain
in the shadows.”


CAUGHT IN THE MIDDLE

Since the ethnic clashes between Meiteis and Kuki-Zo communities, the mistrust
between the Meira Paibis and the central security forces has sharpened.

In Imphal’s Uripok, 70-year-old Tejapati, a Meira Paibi, spelt it out: “The
forces do not support us, they only support the Kukis because they have a pact
with them.”

She was referring to the Suspension of Operations agreement, the peace deal the
Centre signed with the Kuki militant groups in 2008, as the reason for this
bias. Meitei insurgent groups have never come to the table for talks.

As a result, the Meira Paibis argue, the army handles the Kuki militant groups
with kid gloves, often at the cost of the Meiteis. Calls to abrogate the pact
have resounded across the Imphal valley since the initial days of the conflict.

The forces, in particular the Assam Rifles, which is the operational command of
the Indian Army, say they are caught in the middle.

An Indian Army official posted in Imphal, who declined to be identified, said
they were facing “trying times”. “We are not Kuki’s army, or the Meitei’s army…
we are the Indian Army, and we are only trying to ensure everyone’s, regardless
of community, peace and security,” he said.

According to him, partisan media reports and rumours had “fuelled mistrust
against the security forces”, undermining their “hard-earned” credibility.

In June, the rift came to such a head that the Army released a video statement
outlining the challenges. It said a stand-off with a 1,200-1,500 women-led mob
in Itham on June 23 forced them to “release” 12 cadres of banned insurgent group
Kanglei Yawol Kanna Lup – including the mastermind of a 2015 ambush case.

A few days later, the Dimapur-based III Corps of the Indian Army (also known as
Spear Corps) put out a tweet, complete with video illustrations, of how the
women were interfering in their operations by accompanying armed rioters in
vehicles, blocking entry of forces in riot-hit areas, interfering in the
movement of logistics by digging up roads, among other things.

Such actions, the Imphal-based Army official alleged, were meant to aid the
valley-based retired Meitei insurgents who had reactivated themselves in this
conflict. “The Kuki militants had already joined the fray, and the defunct
valley-based ones saw it as a good time to jump in,” he said. “They want a safe
corridor to go join the fight. Who to use to ensure that? The Meira Paibis.”

The insurgent groups, the army official said, are using various Meira Paibi
groups to shield themselves. In the heyday of the insurgency, when the Indian
state combed towns and villages across Manipur to pick up Meitei youths on
suspicion of being insurgents, the Meira Paibi are reported to have played a
similar role: they took the security forces head on to block their operations.

Meira Paibis lined up on the streets in Uripok, Imphal, to protest against the
killing of a 19-year-old Meitei man.


A MOVEMENT ‘INDEPENDENT OF GENDER’

On July 15, Lucy Marem, a Maring Naga woman, was killed near the foothills of
Keibi Heikak Mapal village in Imphal East district, after a group of women
allegedly handed her over to armed miscreants. Marem’s death elicited strong
reactions from the Naga community in Manipur, the third major ethnic community
in Manipur, one which has remained neutral in this conflict so far.

The United Naga Council, the apex body of the Nagas, issued a statement, calling
out the Meira Paibis. “It is unimaginable for a women’s organisation like Meira
Paibis, who profess to be torch bearers of peace, partaking in acts of such
killings,” the statement said.

Indeed, this has vexed many people, particularly those outside the state: How
could a women’s organisation with such a rich history of standing up against
injustice be party to crimes against women?

Senior Meira Paibis and Meitei civil society leaders Scroll met cited “lack of
organisation” and the “decentralised structure” of the movement as a reason for
the alleged transgressions.

Khuraijam Athaouba, who is the spokesperson of the Coordinating Committee on
Manipur Integrity, or Cocomi, an umbrella organisation of six groups
representing Meiteis said: “What happened in Imphal [during the initial days]
was a spontaneous response of common people.” He added: “That is why there are
so many irregularities in the way people behaved.”

Ema Lungwaleima, a Meira Paibi in her sixties, agreed. “No one was prepared … no
one knew that a warlike situation was imminent. Since it happened suddenly,
people took up their own ways to protect themselves,” she said. “Maybe their own
family members were killed and hurt, and it could have entirely been an
emotional reaction… a lot happened in Churachandpur [where the Meiteis are a
minority] too.”

However, conversations with many Meira Paibis made it quite clear that most of
them were not guided by feminist principles. It was the community that took
precedence over gender for most women’s groups in Manipur. As this article by
Meitei academic Kapil Arambam notes, the Meira Paibi movement is “independent of
gender”.

The Imphal-based academic also said she would “refrain from describing Meira
Paibis as feminists”. “Sure, it is a women’s movement but most of the causes
they espouse are for the community,” she said. “They hardly talk about
themselves, their bodily rights, their reproductive rights. Perhaps the 2004
Kangla Fort protest was one of the few times that they spoke out against sexual
violence women faced.”

Added the activist: “It’s not as much about women as it is about identity.”

The tide of allegations against the Meira Paibis has prompted other civil
society organisations to intervene.

In May, the Cocomi formed a women’s wing to “streamline the movement”, among
other things. Ema Lungwaleima, who is the general secretary of the wing, said
she was going to neighbourhoods asking people not to indulge in mob violence.
“I’m trying to mobilise them to work together.”

An activist, who works with Meira Paibis in Bishnupur, admitted that many women
were involved in things “they were not supposed to be involved in”. “But they
don’t speak for the whole community,” she said.

The other Meitei woman activist in Imphal, who is not actively involved with the
Meira Paibis, said there was disquiet within the Meira Paibi groups, too.
“Sometimes during our long conversations, some do admit their discomfort about
the role of the Meira Paibis,” she said. “Behind closed doors, they condemn such
incidents [against women] and tell me to continue to speak out. ‘It’s difficult
for us to say certain things,’ they tell me.”


A BREAKDOWN OF OLD ALLIANCES

Angom Nayani grew up in one of the Meitei-dominated pockets that dot the hills
of Churachandpur, her home for more than half a century. She fled the violence
that broke out on the evening of May 3 and reached Moirang in the neighbouring
district of Bishnupur.

Nayani, an active member of the Meira Paibi community, has lived in
Churachandpur since she was six; she is now 60. “I left my life behind,” she
said. That included not just the grocery store she ran, but also friendships,
mostly with women from the Kuki-Zo community. “Initially, when the violence
first erupted, I would still get calls from my friends asking me if I was okay,”
Nayani recalled. But gradually, the calls reduced, before stopping altogether.

Angom Nayani, a Meira Paibi, lived in Kuki-dominated Churachandpur for most of
her life.

Nayani rues not just the loss of these personal bonds but also the solidarity of
women across ethnicities that now lies shattered. A few years ago, Nayani, along
with other Kuki-Zo women in the hills had founded the Joint Women’s
Organisation, a collective that cut across ethnicities, to raise issues of
shared civic interests.

As Ema Lungwaleima of Cocomi had explained, “All the ‘mothers’ associations’[an
oft-used nomenclature for women’s civil society groups in the North East] would
work together: Nagas, Kukis, Meiteis.”

Sitting on a bench outside the relief camp, Nayani said much of it seemed like a
“dream now”. “That we even had an organisation, that at one point it was
possible,” she said. “Everything changed after May 3.”

She is sceptical about the possibility of Meitei and Kuki women coming together
to initiate a peacebuilding process. “This time the situation is very bad. They
[the Kukis] are asking for a separate administration…total separation. So even
the government cannot control anything, so what can we Meira Paibis do?”

“We can only appeal,” Nayani said. Then she quickly added: “If only I could
reach out to the women.”

The writer is a Guwahati-based independent journalist. Her Twitter handle is
@ToraAgarwala

All photos by Tora Agarwala

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 * Manipur
 * Meira Paibis
 * Meitei-Kuki conflict
 * Violence against women

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