Back-burning Manipur’s woes

Jaideep Saikia

(jdpsaikia@gmail.com)

Manipur and Myanmar are not just adjacent geographical entities. The two share a common vascular structure. The destinies of the Imphal Valley and the Chindwin Basin have been fused by shared ethnicity, trade routes, and a porous boundary that have defied the stiff cartography of centuries. Today, this intimacy has evolved into a strategic liability. A cycle of volatility has inextricably entangled the two, making an easy escape almost impossible. Indeed, unless India adopts a policy of proactive "back-fire" burning-a strategic clearing of the border's insurgent infrastructure-Manipur will remain ensnared in a state of perpetual disorder.

The crisis in Manipur cannot be viewed in isolation from the disintegration of Myanmar. Since the 2021 coup, the Tatmadaw's loss of control over its frontiers has turned its fringes into a vacuum of authority. This vacuum has been filled by a complex web comprising the People's Defence Force, the Ethnic Armed Organisations and the Valley-Based Insurgent Groups of Manipur, who have long maintained sanctuary in the Sagaing Region.

A well-oiled "narco-insurgency" nexus fuels this intertwining. The Golden Triangle has effectively shifted its weight toward the Indian border. The flow of illicit drugs, weaponry, and non-monitored migration has created a self-sustaining ecosystem where regional conflict provides the cover for criminal enterprise. Criminalisation, in turn, funds the next round of ethnic violence in Manipur. It is precisely this "circle of treason" that is holding Manipur to ransom.

In classical firefighting, a "backfire" is a modulated burn set in the path of an advancing wildfire to consume the fuel and halt its advancement. In the India-Myanmar border context, such an exercise translates to a deep-seated shift from passive management to proactive disruption.

Presently, the border acts as a "one-way valve" for terror: insurgents strike in Manipur and retreat into the sovereign "safety" of Myanmar. To break this cycle, India's policy must move beyond mere fencing.

A strategic "backfire" approach would involve (a) surgical disruption which moves away from border defence to active disruption of terror safe havens, primarily in the three neat clusters that house the Group of Five, which includes the UNLF (Koirang), PLA (Manipur), PREPAK, KCP and KYKL. The kinetically primed disruption would necessitate leveraging intelligence to not only squeeze the financial and logistical pipelines that sustain cross-border terror groups before they reach Indian soil but also neutralise the "fertile overground" structure that permits them to operate. (b) The policy ambiguity that has been characterising the Free Movement Regime (FMR) for decades by way of a nod to retain cultural ties has to be severed. The FMR has become the primary conduit for the "grey zone" warfare that Manipur is presently witnessing. The decision to scrap the FMR and begin fencing the border was one of the wisest of decisions. The author had hailed the farsightedness of Amit Shah in this regard. The fence should now act as the first spark in the recommended "backfire." The fence will effectively create a firewall between the internal ethnic tensions of Manipur and the external factors that are seeking to exploit them. (c) A high modicum of kinetic neutrality has to be ensured. India must ensure that the internal chaos of Myanmar's civil war does not spill over to Manipur. This means converting the border into a "dead zone" for armed groups of all descriptions, regardless of whether they claim to be pro-or anti-Naypyidaw. Manipur has to be prevented from becoming a secondary theatre of Myanmar's war.

Without a decisive "clearing" of the border ecosystem, Manipur's domestic ethnic reconciliation will continue to resist resolution. Foreign actors can continue to pump sophisticated weaponry and drug money into the state, weaponising local grievances. Although land and strange social rights were triggers for the unrest in Manipur, the ailment of Manipur is a fever caused primarily by a cross-border scourge.

The manner in which Manipur's and Myanmar's ethnicities snake into each other is a historical truism. But it should not be allowed to become a security death grip. By aggressively "burning away" the insurgent fuel that shapes the border, India can finally decouple Manipur's future from Myanmar's collapse. Only when the border is secured-not just by wire, but by the total elimination of insurgent utility-can Manipur begin to heal.