India’s forgotten state: Manipur and the collapse of conscience

What does it feel like to be expunged from the public imagination? Ask the people of Manipur seared by this reality. In the past two years, they have become citizens of a no-man’s land, forgotten by a country, its people and its government. There has been almost a disdain in the lack of outrage over India’s northeastern state, which has been burning since 2023. Unfortunately, no Olympics took place in the interim. Nothing works more than a medal from a Manipur boxer for the country to claim its people as its own.

The people of Manipur have long seen through this conditional belonging and rightly question why some are more equal than others. Should a country define its responsibility by proximity? Barring two women who were gang-raped and then disrobed and paraded through the streets, the news coming from the state has also not been sensational enough for mainstream media. Big newsrooms are programmed to not report on the uncomfortable. Manipur flared while it was under the BJP rule and its much-touted double-engine with power both at the centre and state.