3 Years After Manipur Ethnic Violence, Families Of Missing People Still Await Them

Three years after the outbreak of ethnic violence in Manipur on May 3, 2023, the families of missing people have renewed their appeal for justice, accountability and urgent government action, stating that more than 30 from the valley areas who went missing during the height of the crisis are still untraceable.

In a statement on Saturday, the families said the last three years have been filled with "unbearable silence, uncertainty and endless waiting," as they continue to search for answers about the fate of their loved ones.

According to the families, many of those missing disappeared during the initial phase of the violence while trying to return home, escape to safety or survive amid the chaos. Despite filing first information reports (FIRs), approaching multiple authorities and even going to the Manipur High Court with the help of lawyers and rights activists, they alleged there has been no meaningful progress in tracing the missing people.

The families asked the state government to fulfil its constitutional responsibility and ensure the cases are not forgotten. They also highlighted the legal and procedural challenges they continue to face. Under the rules, a missing person can only be legally declared dead after seven years, making it impossible for families to obtain death certificates before that period. Without death certificates, many affected families are unable to access government schemes, compensation and promised job benefits.

Kabita Devi, whose husband has been missing since the violence began, said the family continues to suffer in uncertainty.

"My husband was a central government employee. After this incident, we still don't know where he is. The government had promised jobs and support, but nothing has been given," she said.

"They are asking us to show the death certificate as without it we cannot access the benefits that are our rights. We have been told to wait for seven years, but how can we live like this without answers?" she said, questioning the requirement of the document for taking assistance.

Another family member, Ranjita Devi, whose husband also went missing during the violence, said the prolonged uncertainty has devastated their lives. "My husband has been missing since that day. We don't know whether he is alive or not. We have been asking for help, but there has been no concrete response," she said.

She said the family has been struggling to survive, and it has become very difficult to run the house and take care of children. "We just want the government to find our loved ones and give us justice."

Reiterating that the missing people are not mere statistics but individuals with families waiting for answers, the families appealed to both the authorities and society not to let the issue fade away.

"Help us bring truth, justice and dignity to the missing and their families. Until they are found, our struggle will continue," the statement said.

"Deeply Troubling Phase"

In a separate statement, the Meitei Alliance said the state bordering Myanmar has entered a deeply troubling phase.

"... In the course of the violence, widespread propaganda has shaped and circulated misleading interpretations of both the causes of the disturbances and their consequences. The initial outbreak has often been narrowly portrayed as a unified tribal response to the Meitei demand for Scheduled Tribes status, particularly in light of the recommendation made by the Manipur High Court to consider the matter. Such narratives have reduced a complex and layered conflict into overly simplistic binaries - tribal versus non-tribal (Meitei), majority (Meitei) versus minority (tribal), hill (tribal) versus valley (Meitei), or Hindu (Meitei) versus Christian (tribal). They obscure the deeper structural tensions, historical grievances, and political complexities that underpin the disturbances, thereby distorting public understanding of the actors involved, as well as the context and nature of the conflict," the influential global umbrella body of Manipur's Meitei community said in the statement.

It said that "one-sided representations have portrayed the government led by the BJP in Manipur as primarily advancing Meitei interests at the expense of Kuki communities, while also casting the Meitei population in an aggressive and villainous light."

"Such portrayals obscure important realities... The disturbances must be understood within a broader structural context shaped by a long-evolving economic, political, and social trajectory. This trajectory, often associated with a neo-liberal policy framework, has been marked by uneven development, persistent underdevelopment, corruption, political manipulation, illicit economic networks, demographic pressures, ecological strain, and patterns of marginalisation and deprivation."

The Meitei Alliance said the failure to adequately protect lives, property and livelihoods has deepened insecurity, forcing communities to organise for self-defence and, at times, retaliation, further intensifying the cycle of violence and mistrust.

It is one of the two organisations - the other is a key civil body of the indigenous distinct tribe Thadou - that met for the first time on a common platform and for a common goal since the outbreak of ethnic violence in Manipur. The Meitei Alliance and the Thadou Inpi Manipur on March 8, 2025 called the development a "significant and historic moment".