Naga and Kuki clashes kill nine in Manipur as the Suspension of Operations pact lapses

LeadPrelims and Mains31 Oct 2026

Why in news

Two days of armed clashes between Kuki and Naga groups in October 2026 killed nine people in Kamjong, Kangpokpi and Ukhrul districts of Manipur. Unofficial counts put the toll at eleven, including two members of the Myanmar based Kuki National Army Burma.
The Suspension of Operations pact between the Centre, the State and the Kuki Zo armed groups lapsed on 4 September 2026 and has not been renewed. Officials call the pact in abeyance until the groups surrender every weapon.
Later in the month gunmen killed three Meitei firewood collectors at Nongshum, on the border of Imphal East and Kangpokpi. The violence now touches all three communities: Meitei, Kuki and Naga.

Manipur's valley is Meitei and its hills are Naga and Kuki. The Meitei Kuki violence of 2023 brought President's Rule. Within days of its revocation the first Naga Kuki killings began, and more than 40 people have died in that violence since. The timeline gives the dates.

The Centre renewed the Suspension of Operations pact in 2025 on revised ground rules, which the map gives. The pact expired in September 2026.

Kamjong, on the Myanmar border, is Naga. In the first week of October the Army and the Assam Rifles defused 27 improvised explosive devices along 8 km of the border there. The killings began there, and attacks on villages near the border continued, with houses burned.
Kangpokpi is Kuki. The violence spread there from Kamjong. Later in the month security forces raided and took over the Sinai camp of Kuki Zo groups near Nongshum, and the police said 17 of those found were impersonating registered cadres.
Ukhrul is Naga. Each side blamed the other's armed group. Kuki groups named the Isak Muivah faction of the National Socialist Council of Nagalim. Naga groups named the Kuki National Army Burma.

A second fault line has opened.

The 2023 violence ran between the Meitei valley and the Kuki hills. October's ran between two hill communities, Naga and Kuki, over land and the border districts they share.
A peace built on separating Meitei and Kuki does not address this line at all.

The pact has become the dispute.

The pact was meant to hold Kuki groups in camps while talks went on.
Meitei and Naga groups see the camps as armed sanctuaries.
The Sinai raid found 18 people in a camp sanctioned for 150, proof that the groups were not keeping the ground rules.
Without the pact, though, the groups are simply armed and free.

Arms in civilian hands drive the killings.

Mobs looted many of the weapons from police armouries in 2023, and the 27 devices on one 8 km stretch show what the border supplies.
Disarmament, not the pact's wording, is the real question.

The border is part of the war.

The Kuki National Army Burma is based in Myanmar, and armed groups cross a porous border in both directions.
Nobody can settle Manipur's violence without controlling the frontier, and nobody can fence the frontier without touching the communities that live on both sides of it.

Decide the pact's future in the open. Tie any renewal to verified disarmament and camp audits, so that the camps hold what the ground rules say they hold.
Restart talks with all three communities at once. A Meitei Kuki settlement that leaves out the Nagas now solves half the problem.
Recover the looted weapons through a time bound surrender and amnesty, and prosecute what remains.

Prelims:
- Suspension of Operations is tripartite: Centre, State and the armed groups
- First signed in 2008 with the Kuki National Organisation and the United People's Front
- Lapsed on 4 September 2026
- Kamjong and Ukhrul border Myanmar and are Naga; Kangpokpi is Kuki
- The India Myanmar border is 1,643 km long
- The Meitei Kuki violence began on 3 May 2023
- The Kuki National Army Burma is based in Myanmar

Mains: "Manipur's crisis now has more than one ethnic fault line." Examine the challenges in restoring peace, with reference to the Suspension of Operations pact.

Show the questions

Mains 2025 GS3: What are the major challenges to internal security and peace process in the North-Eastern States? Map the various peace accords and agreements initiated by the government in the past decade.
Mains 2019 GS3: Cross-border movement of insurgents is only one of the several security challenges facing the policing of the border in North-East India. Examine the various challenges currently emanating across the India-Myanmar border. Also, discuss the steps to counter the challenges.
Mains 2017 GS3: The North-East region of India has been infested with insurgency for a very long time. Analyze the major reasons for the survival of armed insurgency in this region.

Sources

Settled facts (dates of Acts, constitutional provisions, standing definitions) are from standard references.