New Delhi: The Union government could be withdrawing personnel of the Rapid Action Forces from Manipur, where they are among security forces deployed to control the brutal ethnic violence.The Hindu has reported that it was told by a senior government official that “continuous exposure of the RAF to the anti-insurgency theatre may be not suitable for a force trained in crowd control and law and order duties, including agitation and communal incidents.”The Indian Army had said in statement then that “one rioter was killed while few others were injured during the failed attempt” to loot weapons from the India Reserve Battalion (IRB) at Khangabok in Thoubal.The report notes that 10 companies of the RAF are deployed in the state which is sharply divided along ethnic lines now. Among the 10, eight are in the Valley districts and two are in the hills.The report notes that a whopping 36,000 paramilitary and Army soldiers are deployed in Manipur at present. Of them, two Border Security Forces jawans and an Army soldier on leave have been killed.Violence has escalated after a brief lull, leading to fresh deployment of security forces in areas where Meitei and Kuki settlements are adjacent and which have seen the maximum violence.The newspaper has highlighted a recent internal RAF report noting that it was attacked with “glass balls, stones, sharp iron rods and petrol bombs” when they tried to stop a mob of around 3,000 persons from looting weapons from a police armoury in Thoubal in early July.This internal report has also noted, with the example of this Thoubal incident, that senior police officers and local magistrates often do not visit such incident spots, demonstrating what the RAF calls is “significant insensitivity and lack of coordination resulting in mismanaged crowd control and handling of serious conflicts.”The report sheds light on the fact that the RAF is trained to use minimal fire power and is meant to act quickly to diffuse situations with “minimal lethality.”Most of the RAF is unarmed and their deployment in Manipur is “exposing them as a bigger target for firearms of miscreants”, the report said, according to Hindu.Manipur Police and the central forces have emerged at odds with each other, with the Kuki community accusing the former of siding with Meiteis and the Meitei community accusing the latter of favouring Kukis. In August, the Manipur Police filed an FIR against personnel of the 9th battalion of the Assam Rifles, a paramilitary force.
