After 69 days

For those who witnessed the events of 18 June 2001 in Imphal, the images are unforgettable. That morning the entire city was aflame, accompanied by the smell of burning rubber tyres. Trees were downed on the roads to bring traffic – and life – to a standstill. Thousands of people also took to the streets on that day, as Imphal descended into chaos. The state Legislative Assembly was burnt down, as the people protested the decision of the New Delhi government to extend the ceasefire with the armed Naga group, the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah), in some Naga-inhabited parts of Manipur. One of the outfit's longstanding demands has been (and remains) the creation of a pan-Naga homeland, and the extension of the ceasefire was seen as the first step in that direction. One of the enduring images from that day is a girl in a phanek and dupatta stopping a military jeep and banging her head against its bonnet. She was neither an activist nor a volunteer of any student group. She was just a lay person who walked out from nowhere to express distress at what she perceived as a threat to the territorial integrity of Manipur.

What followed is history. In July 2001, the continuing opposition to the move forced the central government to restrict the ceasefire with the NSCN (I-M) to Nagaland and not extend it to other Northeastern states, but not before 18 protesters died by police bullets on 18 June, engaged in what the demonstrators felt was a struggle to save Manipur's territory. The irony is that these young men and women had little sense of belonging to the territory they were protecting, but were still ready to give up their lives for it. Territory is marked only by thin lines, and in Manipur even those lines are often little more than a blur.