Aizawl, May 7 (PTI) : Altogether 596 people from violence-hit Manipur have fled to Mizoram and sought shelters in the state, officials said on Sunday.
Till Sunday evening, at least 151 people belonging to the Chin-Kuki-Mizo community in Manipur have entered the Aizawl district, while 228 fled to the Kolasib near the Assam border and 217 others to Saitual bordering trouble-torn Manipur, Home Commissioner and Secretary H Lalengmawia said.
The majority of the displaced people are lodged at temporary camps in several villages, while others are accommodated by their local relatives, another official said.
“The Manipur people, who have fled their state due to ethnic clashes, sought shelters in Mizoram,” he said.
The administration has made proper arrangements to provide shelter and food to the people fleeing neighbouring Manipur which witnessed bloody ethnic rioting over the last few days, Aizawl deputy commissioner Lalhriatzuali Ralte told PTI.
Disaster management committees have also been reactivated at villages and local councils, she said.
Notably, Mizoram is currently providing shelter to around 30,000 people from Myanmar and Bangladesh, who took refuge in the state.
Myanmar nationals have taken refuge in Mizoram following a military coup there in February 2021, while people belonging to Kuki-Chin from Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tracts fled their villages last year due to a crackdown on an insurgent outfit there.
“Eleven Mizoram students from the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) in Manipur’s Imphal and another 34 from a nursing school in Churachandpur district arrived in Aizawl on Sunday,” the official said.
Fifty Mizoram residents have been evacuated from Manipur to Assam’s Guwahati and 78 others to West Bengal’s Kolkata by flights on Sunday as no charter flight to Aizawl was arranged for them, a state home department official told PTI.
Life, however, started limping back to normalcy under the watchful eyes of army drones and helicopters deployed for aerial reconnaissance as curfew was relaxed on Sunday in parts of Manipur which witnessed bloody ethnic rioting over the last few days.
Violent clashes broke out between tribals and people belonging to the majority Meitei community in Manipur on Wednesday, displacing thousands of people.
The clashes broke out after a ‘Tribal Solidarity March’ was organised in the ten hill districts to protest against the Meitei community’s demand for Scheduled Tribe (ST) status.
Meiteis account for about 53 per cent of Manipur’s population and live mostly in the Imphal valley. Tribals — Nagas and Kukis — constitute another 40 per cent of the population and reside mostly in the hill districts.