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Why
India cannot disturb Manipur Boundary of 1947
By Professor N. Sanajaoba
Issue
Never before since India’s disputed annexation
of Manipur in 1949, has the issue of
balkanization of Manipur or alteration of her
ancient historical boundary been raised as it is
being done today. The annexation has let loose
unimaginable events like ethnic-cleansing,
highway-blockade, economic strangulation and
claims to respective clan lands and many more
things. Annexation is the Pandora’s Box. In
the 19th century, rival claims over Kabo Valley
by two independent states in South Asia had been
settled through multilateral negotiation on the
production of historical boundary documents by
the legitimate state authority of both the
countries. Even today, an arbitration commission
can easily and peacefully settle similar issues
on the production of century-wise maps of the
boundary by the respective legitimate state
authorities, who had properly undertaken the
state succession under the law.
The editorial of Assam Tribune June 7, 1999) has
captured the ongoing process. Except the
realization in the NSCN (IM) leadership that
their “Sovereignty” cannot be water-tight is
undoubtedly pregnant with the possibilities
justifying cautious optimism about peaceful
resolution. Similarly, the virtual pressing of
the demand for covering all the “areas
inhabited by our forefather” will pose another
hurdle as this will affect the integrity of
Manipur as a State besides demands for
territories from Assam’s North Cachar Hills.
This hurdle will pose greater difficulty than
the sovereignty demand”. The people of Manipur
whose forefathers lived together for two
millennia centuries before the ethnic names have
been adopted or given by the British has put up
strong resistance to this sort of claims. The
All Manipur Students’ Union, as for instance,
lodged strong protest to the Indian Prime
Minister in the 1960s against such moves. The
Sunday Hindustan Standard (January 7, 1968) has
carried the protest, “Manipur split-up
condemned” while stating that any “attempt
for balkanization of Manipur would have serious
consequences”. The Indian Prime Minister,
whose government has illegally annexed the Asian
State of Manipur, might have understood the
outer limits of his jurisdiction in this
context.
The five lakh-strong Manipuri’s historical
rally on August 4, 1997 has resolved that “the
people of Manipur shall resist, as one man, the
sinister and diabolic designs which pose a
tremendous threat to the territorial integrity
of the state and ethnic symbolic harmony of the
people”. Manipur Legislative Assembly has
adopted similar stand by its resolution, dated
March 24, 1995 to resist against all designs,
mooted for disruption of Manipur’s territorial
integrity. *The Burmese insurrection in Manipur
for 500 years had also been repulsed by the
Manipuris in similar fashion in order to
preserve Manipur’s territorial integrity.
The politico-military apparatus, which has to
defend Manipur has been taken over by the
Government of India unlike the situation in
which the Burmese disturbances for five
centuries that had been decisively defeated by
Manipur’s political-military apparatus. In the
changed scenario, we discuss issues that merit
legitimate attention of the constitutional
authorities and international-law-persons by
citing the principles and practices.
The Constitution
Two political constitutions of the post-war
period are relevant in driving home the point.
Article 3 of the 1947 Manipur Constitution
provides, “The territories for the time being
and hereafter vested in the Maharajah are
governed by and in the name of the Maharajah.
All rights, authority and jurisdiction which
appertain or are incidental to the Government of
such territories are exercisable by the
Maharajah subject to the provision of this
Act”. Any Premier of any country in the
neighborhood or his plenipotentiary who has
claims over any part of the territory of Manipur
in 1947 and cites the precise constitution
provision relating to their territory. This is
the first sine qua non for both India and any
other internationally recognized state for a
peaceful negotiation of the claims, should there
be any lawful claim as such. The second
pre-condition relates to historical rights of
that state. How the successive constitutional
rulers of any state whatsoever (chronologically
speaking) had maintained by proper documents,
records and historical official records. The
Burmese in the 19th century produced similar
materials before the boundary commission to Kabo
Valley and Manipur contradicted with her records
and documents. The Government of India can
initiate this process suo-moto without
triggering possible discomfort among the
neighboring states, presently in her union:
governance function cannot abdicate this primary
obligation for conflict of resolution and a
‘white paper’ could also be issued if
possible mishaps have to be averted or
pre-empted in time.
The second instrument is the republican
constitution of India which provides in Article
3, parliamentary power to alter areas,
boundaries of existing states after hearing
‘views’ of the state legislature concerned
which will not bind the President at all. This
article applies to India’s existing states and
not to Manipur, which has been ‘a pre-existing
state’ before the adoption of India’s
Constitution. Rather, it has been an illegally
annexed state to which Article 3 has no
contextual bearing at all. The first schedule of
the Constitution serial No. 19 on Manipur
categorically established the fact that the
territorial integrity of Manipur preceded the
Indian Constitution. This status quo ante of the
pre-existing state cannot be disturbed by a
subsequent provision of the Constitution like
Article 3 or 4 of the Constitution.
The Constitution defines the matters specified
in the Instrument of Accession for legislative
purposes. For Jammu and Kashmir, which like
Manipur had entered into the Instrument of
Accession, Article 370 of the Constitution
provides that the power of the Parliament shall
be limited to ‘matters specified in the
Instrument of Accession governing the
accession’ of Jammu and Kashmir State to the
Dominion of India. Like the British, the Indian
rulers played divide-and-rule policy by denying
the same privilege, enjoyed by Kashmir to
Manipur.
As per the constitution (Application to Jammu
and Kashmir) order, 1954, C.O. 48, the President
of India made the order:
To Article 3, there shall be added the following
proviso, namely:
“Provided further that no bill providing for
increasing or diminishing the area of the state
of Jammu and Kashmir or altering the name or
boundary of that State shall be introduced in
Parliament without the consent of the
Legislature of that state”.
A re-statement has also been subsequently issued
by the Union Government of India. The Government
of India was expected to issue a similar order
in 1954 or thereafter, in regard to the boundary
of Manipur, but it failed her constitutional
responsibility to tread two annexed states on
equal terms. Even today, the Government has the
responsibility to issue a similar order in
regard to Manipur. Claims and counter claims to
balkanize Manipur would not have gathered so
much attention as of now but for the unfairness
of the Government and its deliberate abdication
of constitutional obligations.
To be continued……
(The author teaches at Guwahati University)
(Courtesy: The
All Manipur College Teachers' Association-
Publishers of The Manipur Fact File 2001)
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