Three days after former ATSUM leader Kakai Singsit launched a ‘Fast Unto Death’ strike, demanding justice and immediate release of his three family members put behind the bar in connection with the B Gamnom killing, the All Tribal Students’ Union Manipur (ATSUM) strongly demanded the immediate vindication of the arrested three.
The student body assured that it will leave no stone unturned to deliver justice to the innocent three and conveyed solidarity to their families who are running from pillar-to- post in their quest for justice and vindication but with little respite.
It stated that it has come to light that the arrested persons are innocent civilians who are now unfortunate victims of the “police department’s monstrosity which is under the impression that they have got the complete freedom to do anything they want under the state’s protection and immunity of Armed Forces Special Power Act (AFSPA).”
The trio are in no way connected with the firing incident of B Gamnom village as it can be substantiated by the fact that Hentinseh Singsit was still in New Life Rehabilitation Centre at Changangei Imphal when the B Gamnom firing incident occurred supported by ample evidence and documents, ATSUM stated.
“Hentinseh Singsit left the Rehabilitation Centre only on October 15 which clearly demonstrated that the whole arrest episode was a botched-up operation right from the start,” it added.
It also stated that the police version is marked by plenty of and fanciful claims while the truth is being swept under the carpet to hide their incompetency and unprofessionalism in the matter.
ATSUM pointed out that the man who the police claimed to have been the mastermind of the whole firing incident of B Gamnom, Mangsat Haokip, as the vice chairman of KNF-N was already behind the bar in Sajiwa Jail two months before the B Gamnom firing incident while the police had claimed that the trio is working under Mangsat Haokip.
“Such claims of the police are totally absurd and laughable as all evidence speaks otherwise,” it added.
The three of them are known drug users and in no way connected with the KNF-N as claimed rather they are innocent civilians and in fact, the family members and villagers have substantiated that they have either never moved out of the village when the incident occurred while one of them was in a rehabilitation centre, ATSUM further stated.
This debacle of the police had given the family members intolerable humiliations, untold harassment, demonization, financial privations and mental trauma which are simply outrageous and unacceptable in a democratic dispensation, it added.
ATSUM urged the state government to seriously look into the matter for the sake of justice and future deterrence, and appealed to take fitting punishments to all the erring police personnel who are found to be involved in the whole debacle so that the same does not occur again in the future.
