Hailstorm wreaks havoc in India’s Manipur

May 07, 2024

IMPHAL: One person was killed and over 15,000 houses, including churches, were destroyed after a hailstorm struck strife-torn Manipur state in northeast India on May 5.

Initial reports reveal a man had died and 15,425 houses were destroyed, said state Chief Minister N Biren Singh.

The state government has sanctioned a financial package to arrange relief materials, he told reporters on May 6.

The government has opened 42 relief camps to accommodate the people whose houses were damaged. Educational institutions in the hilly state will remain closed till May 7.

At least six churches were damaged in the hilly areas after their roofs flew away in the storm, said a Church official who did not want to be named.

“We are now taking stock,” he said and added that the situation was not conducive to undertaking relief works.

“We will, however, try our best to help our people who already lost everything in the ethnic violence,” the Church official told UCA News on May 7.

The worst-hit places are Imphal West and Imphal East districts in the valley where up to 11,000  houses were damaged, the chief minister noted.

Valleys in the state are inhabited by the majority Meitei community while indigenous Kuki-Zo Christians live in the hilly districts.

In Churachandpur, a tribal stronghold and the nerve center of sectarian strife, 540 houses perished in the hailstorm.

Manipur, bordering Myanmar, witnessed unprecedented violence since May 3 last year between Kuki tribal Christians and the Meitei Hindu community.

The sectarian strife started over granting tribal status to the influential Meiteis that would guarantee them reservation quotas in education and government jobs under India’s affirmative action.

Christians who make up nearly 41 percent of Manipur’s 3.2 million population are against granting reservation quotas to the Meiteis who form a majority of the state's 53 percent Hindus.

The violence has claimed over 220 lives and a majority of them are Christians. More than 50,000 people were uprooted and over 350 Churches and Church-run institutions were set on fire. The violence is still going on.

The indigenous Christians accuse the chief minister who belongs to the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi of supporting the Meiteis.--ucanews.com