In search of safety, Kuki cop fled to Churachandpur; killed four months later

Sukrita Baruah

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Haokip was shot dead on Wednesday afternoon at N Chingphei village, close to Churachandpur’s boundary with Bishnupur. His final rites were held in Churachandpur on Thursday.

Sub-inspector Onkhomang Haokip, a Kuki police officer, had fled from his posting in Meiti-dominated Bishnupur district.

After large-scale violence spread across Manipur on May 3, sub-inspector Onkhomang Haokip, a Kuki police officer, fled from his posting in Meiti-dominated Bishnupur district, seeking safety in Kuki-dominated Churachandpur. More than four months later, he was shot dead while on duty in a district where he thought he would be safe.

Haokip, 35, was shot dead on Wednesday afternoon at N Chingphei village, close to Churachandpur’s boundary with Bishnupur. His final rites were held in Churachandpur on Thursday.

His wife Lalbiekkim and their four children live in Churachandpur. She said had been posted in Bishnupur district ever since he joined the police force in 2009. Most recently, he was posted at the police station in Moirang, which had in May become a major centre of violence.

“The officer in charge advised him to stay away from Moirang and leave because he would not be safe there. He was there on May 3 and May 4, but in the early hours of May 5, he escaped in his private vehicle,” she said.

 

Sub-inspector Onkhomang Haokip’s wife Lalbiekkim and their four children live in Churachandpur. (Photo: Special Arrangement)

When he drove down to Churachandpur, where his family was, she said that he had brought two other Kuki men with him. “The two men had been beaten up by a mob and were rescued and kept in Moirang police station. But because they weren’t safe there either, my husband brought them with him to help him escape,” she said.

Like other police personnel displaced by the conflict, he reported to the Superintendent of Police, Churachandpur, and one of his colleagues said that he was called on for duty whenever there was a requirement for reinforcements.

The outpost at Chingphei, where he was killed, had been created only a few days ago, after three days of heavy firing along the Churachandpur-Bishnupur border towards August-end, which claimed nine lives.

“Following those incidents, Churachandpur police deployed 24×7 police presence in the area. Haokip was sent there as an additional force only after September. And then he was shot by an unknown person from a distance while on duty,” said his colleague.

Lalbiekkim said that she thought the worst was over for her family after her husband came home. “Since then he has been sent somewhere or the other for duty for the last four months. There were no Meitei villages in the vicinity of the place where he was killed, so I thought things would be okay,” she said.