Drugs, insurgency, religion: The real reasons behind Manipur's ethnic conflict

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Manipur on Saturday, September 13. It was his first visit since ethnic violence pushed the northeastern state into a state of civil war in May 2023.

Clashes erupted in Manipur on May 3, 2023. They were triggered by a Manipur High Court order that suggested granting Scheduled Tribe status to Manipur's majority Meitei community.

About 260 people have been killed since, more than 60,000 displaced, and battle lines have been carved through the state. Two years on, the BJP governments in the state and the centre are still struggling to settle the dispute.

The underlying ethnic divisions are deep-rooted and difficult to untangle. Armed insurgencies, affirmative action, drugs, refugees, and religion are all factors that came together to create the perfect storm in Manipur. There is a deeply entrenched ethnic divide in the state, pitting the Meitei and the Kuki-Zo people against each other.

Manipur’s Ethnic Groups

Manipur’s capital, Imphal, lies in a valley, surrounded by hills on all sides. This differing terrain is a natural border, separating the state’s different ethnic groups. The Imphal Valley is mostly inhabited by the Meiteis, and the hilly districts are home to the Kuki-Zo and Naga people. Some hill districts have a clear Kuki or Naga majority, while some are mixed.

The Naga people also live in Nagaland, and in some regions of Myanmar. Meanwhile, the Kuki-Zo people are part of a larger cultural group with the Mizo people of Mizoram, and the Chin people of Myanmar. So, there are three distinct ethnic groups, spread across multiple Indian states and a neighbouring country. This divide has led to numerous conflicts in the state over the decades.

History of Insurgencies in Manipur

The Meiteis have always been the majority in Manipur, and they have always held the most political clout. A Meitei dynasty had ruled Manipur when it was an independent Kingdom, and then a princely state in the British Raj. Soon after India’s independence from the British, some Meitei people began an armed insurgency to get independence from India.

Meanwhile, some Naga people in Manipur took up arms to join a Naga independence movement. They sought to carve out an independent Greater Nagaland or Nagalim. This led to clashes between the Naga insurgents and the Kuki-Zo people who inhabited the same hilly regions in Manipur.

So, the Kuki-Zo people formed their own militant groups. Some were for defence, but some started demanding greater regional autonomy, or even their own state called Kukiland.

Thus, all the major ethnic groups in Manipur eventually formed their own militant factions. And each group took part in an insurgency against India. The insurgencies were reportedly aided by external backers, like Pakistan and China, who provided the militants with advanced weapons. So, Manipur came to be divided along ethnic lines, and it was highly militarised, all the way back in the 1980s.

Over the decades, successive Indian governments oversaw counter-insurgency operations in Manipur. Most of the ethnic militant groups eventually gave up their armed struggle over time.

A key breakthrough took place in 2008, with the signing of the Suspension of Operations, or SoO, agreement. Under this agreement, the Indian government, the Manipur state government, and 25 Kuki militant groups agreed to “suspend operations”.

The Kuki groups agreed to stop their militant activities and stop recruiting new cadres. They also agreed to restrict their movements to designated camps. In exchange, members of the outfits were given monthly stipends of ₹6,000. The militants were also allowed to keep their advanced weapons at their campsites, albeit under lock and key.

While the Kuki groups hailed the SoO as a path to peace, a number of Meitei organisations were not happy. To the Meiteis, their former enemies had been given amnesty. They had also been allowed to keep their guns. And despite the official restriction on movement, Meitei groups believed that Kuki militants were still moving around freely, and indulging in a growing cross-border drug trade.

Manipur’s Drug Problem

The prevailing sentiment among a large number of Meitei people is that the Kuki-Zo people are heavily involved in the production and distribution of illegal drugs. Ever since violence erupted in Manipur, Meitei people have held demonstrations to protest against what they call “Chin-Kuki Narco-Terrorism". It’s the vilification of an entire community, and it has roots in Manipur’s insurgencies.

Militant groups usually start funding their activities with donations from people sympathetic to the cause. Then, it often moves to forced donations, i.e. extortion. But that isn’t sustainable for long, so militant groups look for other avenues of funding, and they often turn to drugs. Kuki militants in Manipur have been accused of doing this.

Manipur’s former Chief Minister, N. Biren Singh, has been a key player in the Manipur Crisis. The crisis unfolded under his watch, and he was even accused of being partisan towards the Meitei community until he resigned in February 2025.

But his role goes further back. In 2018, a year after becoming the Chief Minister, N. Biren Singh launched a War on Drugs, and it eventually started to take a communal tone.

Even though members of all the communities in Manipur had been implicated in the drug trade over the years. Around the time the ethnic violence erupted in Manipur, a social media smear campaign was launched to vilify the entire Kuki-Zo community as “Narco-Terrorists”. And the Meitei ire is towards the larger Chin-Kuki-Zo community, including Chin refugees from Myanmar.

Myanmar Civil War’s Impact in Manipur

Myanmar has become the Opium capital of the world. It always had a bad reputation, because it lay in the so-called “Golden Triangle”, but things have gotten worse since the 2021 Myanmar civil war.

Armed ethnic groups across Myanmar have been fighting against the military junta. And they need money to stand up against the dictatorial regime and its vastly superior arsenal. So, drug production has skyrocketed in the country. Opium, Heroin, Methamphetamine and a local variant known as Yaba. The production of all these illegal narcotics has surged over the past few years. And the drug problem is spilling over.

There have been numerous reports about drugs making their way from Myanmar into Manipur. Some get sold in the state and the rest of India, but the drugs are also smuggled to international markets. The proceeds are often used to buy weapons to fight against Myanmar's military junta.

Meanwhile, refugees from Myanmar have been crossing the border into India. The military junta is conducting an indiscriminate bombing campaign against all opponent factions, and they are targeting non-combatants as well.

Therefore, millions of people have been displaced in Myanmar, with more than 64,000 making their way to India. Some Chin people caught in the crossfire have sought refuge among their Kuki-Zo brethren in India. While the state of Mizoram has opened its borders for the refugees, Manipur has been less than welcoming.

The drugs-for-weapons system is well known, so Chin refugees are viewed with suspicion in Manipur. They are accused of bringing more drugs into India. That’s why Meitei protesters often malign both Chin refugees and the Indian Kuki-Zo people. But drugs aren’t the only reason Chin refugees are targeted.

Demographic Change in Manipur

Even before the 2023 flare-up, the delicate ethnic balance in Manipur meant that outsiders were viewed with suspicion. Chin refugees meant that the larger Chin-Kuki-Zo community's numbers have been increasing in Manipur, giving them more clout. The state’s dominant Meitei people are not happy with this.

Many fear demographic change. Both ethnic, and religious. Meitei people are mostly Hindu, or they follow a traditional religion called Sanamahism. There are minority Muslim, Buddhist and Christian Meiteis, but most are Hindu or Sanamahist.

The Chin-Kuki-Zo people however are majority Christian. This stems back to the British colonial era, when Christian missionaries were very active in the hills of Northeast India and Myanmar. So, with Chin refugees coming in, Meitei people felt they were at risk of becoming a minority in their own state. This led to a backlash and the growth of two Meitei ethno-religious groups: the Meitei Leepun and the Arambai Tenggol.

The groups champion the Hindu and Sahamanist faiths, respectively, though there is a significant overlap. Both factions believe that the Meitei people are in danger of being overrun by other ethnic groups.

Both groups have received patronage from prominent Meitei politicians, such as Leishemba Sanajaoba, a member of Manipur’s erstwhile royal family and a member of parliament from the Bharatiya Janata Party, and Manipur’s former Chief Minister, N. Biren Singh.

So, in the lead-up to Manipur’s ethnic violence, you had a history of militancy, a growing drug trade, an influx of refugees threatening to overturn Manipur's delicate demographic balance, and ethno-religious groups with powerful political backers. Manipur was a powder keg, and just one spark was needed to set it off. That spark came in the form of a demand for affirmative action.

Manipur High Court Order

In March 2023, over a month before the violence erupted, the Manipur High Court issued an order. The court told the state government to give its recommendation about whether or not Meitei people should be granted Scheduled Tribe status. This set off a wave of protests by the Kuki-Zo people and the Naga people in Manipur.

Part of the reason for the ethnic divide between Manipur’s hills and the Imphal Valley is that Meitei people are not allowed to purchase land in the hills. The hills are reserved for tribal communities.

The Kuki-Zo and Naga people believed that if the Meiteis were granted ST status, they would start buying land in the hills. They also feared that Meitei people would get access to a larger share of government jobs and other instances of affirmative action.

A major demonstration against the Manipur High Court order took place on May 3, 2023. On that very day, a rumour spread that some Meitei youths had burnt down a Kuki war memorial.

Thousands of Kuki-Zo protesters were already on the streets, and the rumour angered the crowd, which proceeded to attack Meitei houses. This incited Manipur's Meitei groups, who attacked Kuki-Zo houses in Imphal. What started as arson quickly turned to murder.

Manipur Divided

Tens of thousands of people were displaced after the violence erupted on May 3, 2023. Kuki-Zo people were forced to leave Imphal and the other Meitei-dominated districts. Meitei people were forced out of the hills. To this day, about 60,000 people haven't been able to return to their homes. They still live in makeshift camps.

Even today, Kuki-Zo people still can’t go into the Imphal valley. Meitei people are still barred from the hills. There are buffer zones separating the two communities. So, Manipur is de facto divided along ethnic lines.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi held two events during his visit to Manipur on Saturday. One in Churachandpur, and one in the state capital, Imphal. The two locations are bastions of the Kuki-Zo people and the Meitei people respectively. During the events, he made an appeal. He asked the two communities to opt for peace and progress. Will the Prime Minister’s words inspire a reconciliation? Or are Manipur’s wounds still too fresh for peace to have a chance?