Prime Minister Narendra Modi will on Thursday reply to the no-confidence motion brought by the Opposition parties in a bid to corner the government over the violence raging in Manipur. Addressing the parliament yesterday, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi questioned why the Prime Minister has not visited Manipur yet. “The Prime Minister has not gone to Manipur because he doesn’t consider it a part of India. You (BJP) have divided Manipur,” he said amid loud protests from the treasury benches. Meanwhile, Union Home Minister Amit Shah presented a report card of the Centre in terms of fighting Covid and the drug menace. He also clarified the government’s efforts in addressing the Manipur violence and alleged the no-confidence motion was brought to “mislead people”.While speaking during the debate on the no-confidence motion, Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury compared Prime Minister Narendra Modi to fugitive Nirav Modi. “You should've held a ‘Mann ki Baat’ with the people of Manipur,” Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said during the debate on no-confidence motion. Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury speaking for the no-confidence motion said, “The power of no-confidence motion is such that we brought PM Modi to the Parliament. We just wanted the Prime Minister of India to come forward and speak on the Manipur issue.”
Taking on the BJP government over the Manipur violence, TMC MP Mahua Moitra said such a type of ethnic violence was not witnessed in any state for the last many decades.“6,500 FIRs in three months, which state has seen this? Four thousand houses destroyed, 60,000 people displaced, which state has seen this?” she said during the no-confidence motion debate in Lok Sabha. At least 120 people have been killed since May in armed clashes in Manipur, a remote state in northeast India with a history of ethnic conflict. The dispute stems from animosity between Manipur's Meitei majority and the Kuki, one of several tribal groups in the state that make up about 16 percent of its population. The Meitei are predominantly Hindu and largely live in urban centres, while the mainly Christian Kuki usually live in scattered settlements in the state's hills. Things came to a head in May over plans to recognise the Meitei as a "Scheduled Tribe" -- a status already conferred upon the Kuki. This would grant them a form of affirmative action through guaranteed quotas of government jobs and college admissions. Kuki groups staged protests over fears the plans could reduce their own entitlements, with rallies quickly spiralling into violence. Protesters set fire to vehicles and buildings, and Meitei mobs armed with guns and petrol cans then attacked Kuki settlements in the hills..