“The role of a student body in a society is to work for the betterment of the student community and not to indulge in such illegal acts”. said Chandel district MLA and Youth Affairs & Sports Minister
Lelen Vaiphei
If recent events are at all indicators of how embedded violence is in Manipur, the arson attack on St. Joseph Higher Secondary School, Sugnu, Chandel district is a perfect example.
On the night of 25th April, the christian missionary school was set on fire by miscreants. Although timely action save the school from being reduced to ashes, the arson attack which caused no human casualty, destroyed properties worth Rs 35 lakhs and completely demoralised the student and teacher community. What followed was most shocking.
Two members of the Kuki Students Organization (KSO), Gunpi block, David Jamminlen Baite (30), who is the education secretary of the student body and Thangkhanlal Haokip (26), an executive member were arrested by the police the next day, suspecting their involvement in the arson attack.
Police revealed that KSO Gunpi Block, under the leadership of David Jamminlen Baite had issued a notice to shut down the school from 25th April if the school authority failed to reciprocate to their demand to revoke of a suspension order slapped on six girl students. A week before the arson attack, the school authorities had initiated disciplinary action on the six girls.
School Principal, Fr Dominic said one of the reprimanded students took to social media to allegedly post abusive content about the school and the class teacher who pulled up the students for indiscipline.
Even though the KSO, Gunpi block has denied its involvement in the arson, what is clear is what started as a disciplinary action has led to the gutting down of ten classrooms and the office of the Principal. This is not only about indiscipline but a ‘demonstration’ of who is calling the shots.
Digging deeper into the incident, it is discovered that one of the girl student who was suspended from school is a relative of a local functionary of an insurgent outfit, currently under Suspension of Operation, SoO, Agreement with the government.
When the school authority took the correctional measures on the girls, the relative of the insurgent took it as an insult to the cloud she enjoys and apparently started pulling strings. The KSO was involved and one incident led to the other. The KSO demanded the punishment to be quashed and on the refusal of the school authority to give in to their demand the arson attack took place.
Seeing the obvious link in the chain of events, Chandel district MLA and Youth Affairs & Sports Minister, Letpao Haokip after inspecting the ill fated school, condemned the arson attack and said,“the role of a student body in a society is to work for the betterment of the student community and not to indulge in such illegal acts”.
Soon after the arson attack, a joint action committee against the torching of the school was formed to exert pressure on the state administration to book the culprits and prevent such incident from repeating in the future. The people’s committee slammed the state government over the manner in which it is handling the case and demanded that justice be delivered at the earliest.
As if responding of the criticism, education minister, Thokchom Radheshyam Singh visited the school on 10th May and expressed his dismay at the attack on the school and saying, “in this age when the education sector has assumed primary importance, the act committed against one of the oldest Catholic schools in the state is a matter of shame.”
During the visit, the education minister assured that the state government will not remain a silent spectator and the culprits will be booked at the earliest. “In regard to the incident, the police have already started arresting several suspects,” the minister said.
Significantly, the Manipur High Court has rejected the anticipatory bail applications of those student leaders who are in police remand in connection with the attack on the school.
Since the arson attack, the second oldest catholic school of Manipur has remained closed in protest against the incident. While the school is likely to reopen on the plea of the state government with the assurance that the culprits will be punished, students of the school have become disoriented with the happening centered around their school. Charles, a student of the higher secondary school said that such incidents really affects him so much so that he fears going to school again when it reopens.
