Four tribal MLAs resign over new bill in Manipur

They feel legislations will derail peace talks

Four sitting members of the Manipur Legislative Assembly of the Naga People’s Front (NPF) have resigned from their membership of the Assembly on Saturday night as a mark of protest over the three bills passed on August 31.

The passing of the bill sparked violence in Churachandpur districts last week where atleast nine people were killed and several injured.

The four MLAs — L Dikho, Samuel Risom , S.T Victor Nunghlung and Dr V.Alexander Pao — all from NPF, decided to resign since they felt the Assembly could not protect the interest of the tribal people including the Nagas who dominate in the hill districts in Manipur.

“Our resignations are aimed at condemning the Protection of Manipur People Bill, 2015 which treats Nagas and other tribes from Nagaland and other states in the region as non-Manipuris, compelling them to have inner line permit (ILPs) to enter Manipur thereby making them foreigners in their own land. Such a legislation is squarely contrary to the very spirit of the agenda on the table of the Naga Peace talks. This legislation is nothing but a ruse to derail the Indo-Naga peace talks and thus not only anti-Naga but anti-national” read a joint press statement issued by the four MLAs.The NPF MLAs further said that they had sought time from the Speaker of the State Legislative Assembly for detailed participation in the debate on the bills and the resolution, which was denied.

“We wanted to table our amendments to the bills and resolution so that these draconian legislative measures are tamed to protect the people of the Hill districts, which were not allowed. We were also not allowed to stage a walk out as the Speaker jumped procedure and declared that these measures were passed without due deliberations and without allowing us time to register our final protest of walk out” the statement further added.