WIs it about Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is reluctant to remove him? The Bharatiya Janata Party has been very kind to the former Congress minister. He joined the BJP in October 2016 and became the CM six months later in March 2017. Barely eight weeks before that, in January, Singh’s son was sentenced to five years’ rigorous imprisonment. Imprisonment For the murder of a 21-year-old man in a 2011 road rage case.
In 2020, four BJP MLAs resigned from the party. Its coalition partner, the National People’s Party (NPP), withdrew support to the government, questioning the government’s “one-man approach”. BJP high command lined CM and made peace.
PM Modi is supporting Biren Singh even after over 140 people have died in ethnic clashes in the state since May. In his public address on July 20, he looked angry when he talked about the brutal incident of two Kuki women being paraded naked and raped in Manipur. He talked about the shame of the country due to this. But there was nothing about the Biren Singh-led government – not a word of advice or warning. He looked very upset with the opposition parties. Did he expect that he would remind the Chief Minister of Manipur?Raj Dharma’, It was the Manipur police who handed over the women to the mob who paraded them naked and raped them. Indian Express informed of,
But, as BJP leaders argue, the Chief Minister of Manipur has no need to feel morally ashamed or embarrassed as compared to his counterparts from other states. Because, as the PM suggested on Thursday, crimes against women happen even in Congress-ruled Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.
This brings us to the question why is PM Modi so determined to defend CM Biren Singh.
There are four reasons for this.
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Why won’t PM Modi sack Biren Singh?
Firstly, no one can force PM Modi to do anything. If the opposition parties are demanding Singh’s resignation, they are only helping them. Just like the way he helped Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnav after the Odisha train tragedy – one of the worst rail accidents in recent times.
The second reason is that misgovernance is no reason for the BJP to change the CM. They are replaced at will when politically expedient before elections – Anandiben Patel and Vijay Rupani in Gujarat, Trivendra Singh Rawat and Tirath Singh Rawat in Uttarakhand, BS Yeddyurappa in Karnataka and Biplab Deb in Tripura.
Reason three: The next assembly election in Manipur is four years away, and public memory is short. The BJP-led governments at the Center and in the states were found so reluctant to act during the second wave of COVID-19 that the party’s MPs and MLAs were leaving public with their complaints.
Once the horrors of the second wave, which killed thousands, subsided, the survivors began to applaud PM Modi for vaccinations and free food grains. So, the violence in Manipur will also pass and everyone will forget the stupidity of Biren Singh. Or the strategist of BJP will have to think.
Reason 4: Biren Singh is too valuable to be discarded. He led the BJP to win a majority on its own for the first time in the state assembly in 2022. He is supported by the Hindu Meitei, the main vote bank of the BJP, which accounts for 53 per cent of the population. Moreover, amid this chaos in Manipur, it is not easy to choose a BJP MLA who can replace Singh and set things in order quickly. A change of leadership may worsen the situation.
There is also a feeling in the BJP that if the situation is deteriorating, it is not entirely their fault. The Center has virtually taken things under control, though there is still ambiguity about the invocation of Article 355. On 5 May, the then Manipur DGP P Doungale Said Journalists said the Center has taken the state’s security into its own hands by invoking Article 355, which gives the Center a duty to protect a state from external aggression or internal disturbance. Other state officials later denied this, and the Union Home Ministry has also denied this. ambivalent about this.
Furthermore, it was the Center that prompted the state government to appoint Kuldeep Singh, a retired Indian Police Service (IPS) officer of the West Bengal cadre, who was serving as the Director General of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) as its security advisor. it is said enjoy Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s trust.
Tripura cadre IPS officer Rajeev Singh has been appointed as the DGP of Manipur in place of Doungal, Kuki. Neither of these two officers is from Manipur and they do not have any prior work experience. These top officials are understood to be in direct touch with New Delhi. If he has failed to deliver results so far, Biren Singh cannot be blamed. Imposing President’s rule is politically risky because if the center fails to restore normalcy soon, it will directly question the capability and competence of the Modi government.
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Why should PM Modi sack Biren Singh?
However, there are five reasons why PM Modi should sack the Manipur CM. Firstly, if 30-40 per cent of the population – Kuki and other tribes – do not trust the CM, the situation is unlikely to change till he leaves. The Center should not treat this bloody caste conflict as a law and order problem. This requires a political remedial touch. A Chief Minister who is known to be biased cannot provide it. Given the crisis of confidence in the local political leadership, it is better for the Center to impose President’s rule and hold direct talks with the warring parties. It is said that when Amit Shah visited Churachandpur, he got a good response from the Kuki-Zomi tribals. PM Modi enjoys the trust of both tribals and non-tribals in Manipur. They need to be more actively and directly involved.
Second, while the Center waits for the crisis to abate with time, there are no signs of it even after 11 weeks. Rather, it is in danger of engulfing other states of the Northeast as well. While the Mizoram government struggles to deal with over 12,000 Kuki-Zomi migrants from Manipur, the Meiteis living in the state have started migrating after the Peace Accord MNF Association, an organization of former Mizo militants, issued a statement asking them to leave “for their own safety”. Indian Express informed of,
Many of these Meites are reportedly from the Barak Valley of Assam. As they are going home, Assam government should be careful. there are estimated Five lakh residents of Manipuri origin in Assam.
First Meghalaya saw Kuki-Meitei brawl in Shillong after violence broke out in Manipur in May.
The Northeast is an ethnic mosaic, and any conflict in one place has the potential to manifest itself in different forms across the region.
The third reason why PM Modi should let go of his Manipur government is the adverse political and electoral implications – which is a perfect reason for the BJP to remove a CM. While the ruling party has resorted to whataboutry to respond to the opposition’s attack on the Manipur gangrape incident, it seems to have no regard for its women constituency. Although a series of women-centric schemes and programs – LPG connections, toilet facilities, Beti Bachao Beti Padhao, free food grains during Covid and tap water scheme among others – have endeared PM Modi, the impact seems to be waning. After voting in the last Himachal Pradesh and Karnataka assembly elections and exit poll surveys show how BJP’s support base among women has been shrink and he belongs to congress Emergingcontributed to the latter’s victory in both states.
The BJP is welcome to dismiss this with the argument that people vote differently in Lok Sabha and Assembly elections. However, the ruling party should worry about its message to women voters. It has refused to sack Haryana minister Sandeep Singh while the state police has done so Test A female athlete coach has been accused of sexual harassment for the past seven months.
The BJP’s stout defense of MP Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh in the sexual harassment case against women wrestlers was fresh in people’s memory when a horrifying video from Manipur surfaced. BJP’s comment on this incident seems insensitive and condemnable. The party should reflect on whether it is taking PM Modi’s women voters lightly.
The fourth reason for taking action against Biren Singh is again political – its impact on the tribal votebank. Tribals make up 8.9 per cent of India’s population and have a significant presence in four electoral states – Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Telangana – where the BJP has big stakes. Count on the opposition to talk about the BJP’s failure to protect tribals in Manipur in the coming elections. Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren has already done written He drew President Draupadi Murmu’s attention to the incident in Manipur, saying, “We cannot and should not allow our fellow tribal brothers and sisters to be treated in this appalling barbaric manner.” Tribal organizations in Gujarat have started reacting to the violence in Manipur as they have given a call Close on Sunday. Of course, the Congress was quick to extend support. The BJP can hope that the opposition will heat up more.
Last but not the least, PM Modi should dismiss the Biren Singh government because for once, he does not look like the strong and decisive leader that people started voting for in 2014. He looks unsure, helpless and clueless about how to resolve the crisis in Manipur.
DK Singh is Political Editor at ThePrint. Thoughts are personal.
(Edited by Humra Laeek)