16,788 acres of illegal poppy cultivation destroyed in Manipur in last 7 yrs: CM Biren Singh

Imphal, Aug 9 (IANS) Manipur Chief Minister N. Biren Singh on Thursday said that 412 FIRs were registered and 87 people, including 16 village chiefs, arrested in the last seven years for illegally cultivating poppy, which is used as ingredients of various drugs.Replying to a query raised by Congress MLA Thokchom Lokeshwar Singh, the Chief Minister told the Assembly that altogether, 16,788 acres of illegal poppy cultivation have been destroyed during the last seven years since 2017.Earlier, Biren Singh had said that 877 sq km of forest cover in Manipur was destroyed in 34 years (1987-2021).In another question of Congress legislator Kangujam Ranjit Singh on the Suspension of Operations (SoO) agreement with the Kuki militants, Biren Singh said that the term of the pact has not been extended further from February this year.He said that the SoO agreement was signed between the Central government, the Manipur government and several Kuki militant outfits.The state government, after observing the illegal and unlawful activities of these militant groups, withdrew from the pact in March last year and the decision was communicated to the central government, Singh told the House.The SoO agreement was signed with two conglomerates of Kuki militant outfits — Kuki National Organisation (KNO) and United People’s Front (UPF) — in 2008 and the deal extended periodically thereafter.The Congress was in power in Manipur and the Centre in 2008.”The SoO pact was signed for bringing peace in Manipur,” the Chief Minister said.Several organisations, mostly belonging to the Meitei community, including civil bodies and women’s vigilante groups, had sent several memoranda to both the Central and state governments raising the urgent necessity to abrogate the SoO between the Centre and the Kuki-Zo militant groups to reinstate normalcy in Manipur.The organisations have claimed violations of SoO provisions by Kuki-Zo militant groups since the ethnic violence broke out in the state on May 3 last year.The Coordinating Committee on Manipur Integrity (COCOMI), a prominent civil society body in the state, had also submitted a statement to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to annul the SoO pact with the Kuki militants.–IANSsc/pgh