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Defence & Security
Mahesh

18/11/24 11:17 AM IST

AFSPA in Manipur

In News
  • The Centre recently reimposed the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) in six police station areas of Manipur.
AFSPA
  • AFSPA, which traces its roots to a colonial statute introduced in response to the Quit India Movement in 1942, was retained in independent India.
  • The law was first brought as an ordinance, and then notified as an Act in 1958.
  • Over the years, AFSPA has been imposed in the Northeast, Jammu and Kashmir, and Punjab (during the years of militancy).
  • It remains in force in parts of Nagaland, Assam, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh, and the entirety of J&K.
  • AFSPA gives sweeping powers to the armed forces by providing military personnel blanket immunity for a range of actions.
  • It allows the military to open fire — and even cause death — against any person breaking the law or carrying arms and ammunition.
  • It also gives them the power to arrest individuals and search premises without warrants on the basis of “reasonable suspicion”.
  • There can be no legal proceedings against armed forces personnel for these actions without prior approval from the Centre.
  • AFSPA can be imposed by the Centre or the Governor of a state, on the entire state or parts of it, after these areas are declared “disturbed’’ under Section 3 of the Act.
AFSPA's history in Manipur
  • AFSPA came to the Northeast in the 1950s in the wake of the Naga movement, and the creation of the Naga National Council (NNC).
  • In Manipur, it was imposed in 1958 in the three Naga-dominated districts of Senapati, Tamenglong, and Ukhrul, where the secessionist NNC was active.
  • It was imposed in the 1960s in the Kuki-Zomi dominated district of Churachandpur, which was under the sway of the Mizo insurgent movement, and extended to the rest of the state in 1979, when groups in the Meitei-dominated Imphal Valley began an armed insurgency.
  • The statute has been controversial, with numerous allegations of excesses by the armed forces.
  • The Malom massacre in 2000, and the killing and alleged rape of Thangjam Manorama led to its subsequent removal from the Imphal municipal area.
  • In 2000, Manipuri activist Irom Sharmila began what would become a 16-year-long hunger strike against AFSPA.
  • In 2012, the Extrajudicial Execution Victim Families Association of Manipur filed a case in the Supreme Court, alleging the security forces carried out 1,528 fake encounters between 1979 and 2012. The CBI is probing 94 such killings.
  • AFSPA was lifted from 15 police station areas in the Imphal Valley in 2022, and in the remaining four in 2023. It remains in force in other parts of the state.
Impact of AFSPA
  • While the AFSPA will indeed grant greater freedom to the Army to use force, much will depend on the political will of the government to act — and to deal with the fallouts of strong action.
  • Unlike in most conflict areas, the armed forces in Manipur are currently not only fighting militant groups but also a civil society that is armed to the teeth, thanks in no small measure to weapons looted from police armouries.
  • The government will be wary of the history of AFSPA in the Northeast, where alleged excesses by the armed forces (like in the early years of the Naga insurgency) only ended up strengthening insurgent movements.
  • The ongoing ethnic violence has already provided a second wind to Meitei militant groups such as the PLA and the UNLF, which had been pushed out of the state in the past decade.
  • With or without AFSPA, if the forces know they have the government’s backing, they will act.
  • The recent attack on the CRPF camp in Jiribam is an example.
  • Another officer, however, said the move may have some psychological impact. “It may create some fear among armed miscreants. But all will now depend upon how the Army takes it forward,”
  • The government will have to handle the political implications of its decision to impose AFSPA, something not likely to enthuse the Meitei population that views the Assam Rifles (which is under the Army’s operational control) with suspicion.
  • The move may appear as an olive branch to the hill tribes who have long demanded AFSPA in the Valley.
  • So far, the government’s intermittent efforts to start talks have not yielded results. While it did manage to bring Meitei and Kuki leaders under the same roof in Delhi last month, it failed to initiate a conversation.
Source- Indian Express

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