13/09/2025
When I visited mainland India, one of the most striking sights was the number of beggars on the roadside. Most of them were homeless, hopeless, and living only for their next meal. Their entire existence revolved around filling their stomachs for the day, with no vision of tomorrow.
Back home in Imphal, such scenes were rare. That absence once felt like something special about being Manipuri. But today, it seems Manipur has reached its own turn. The internally displaced persons (IDPs) of Manipur have become the government-made beggars of the future. Once they had homes, livelihoods, and dreams, but everything has turned to ash. Ethnic violence between communities has left them hopeless, homeless, and helpless.
Everyone loves their home. There is no place more special than one’s own house, no bed more comforting than one’s own—even if the roof leaks in the rain. The violence took away from them and made them shelter into camps is to lose not just shelter also hope to live a life.
The violence has inflicted wounds that are both physical and deeply mental. The suffering of these displaced families cannot be measured in statistics. We all know the pain of broken hope—it is hope that fuels life, and when that fuel is gone, the soul has no drive. Today, the IDPs live only for survival, sustained by a single dream: When will we see our home again? When will we go back?
Yet the government seems indifferent. Political parties and civil society organizations perform dramas of concern, but most of it is for self-interest—votes, influence, or power. None take true responsibility. The displaced people are treated as pawns, their misery exploited for political mileage rather than healed with genuine action.
Worse, even we, the people in our homes and on our beds, often detach ourselves, thinking their problem is not ours. We forget that we have the power to pressure the government to act.
Political parties use the IDP crisis only to prove their rivals’ failures. But if even the Prime Minister has not ensured their return or given them a clear assurance, how can one expect an opposition MP to achieve it? Responsibility is shirked at every level.
The displaced remain where they are—waiting, hurting, and forgotten. Unless the government, civil society, and the people of Manipur unite with sincerity, the IDPs may continue to live as beggars of circumstance, robbed of the dignity they once had.
This is not just their struggle. It is ours.