The demand for a Kuki homeland, its history and rationale

The demand for a Kuki homeland, its history and rationale

Subject : Geography

Section: Human geography (Tribes in news)

Context:

Days after Clashes between Manipur’s Kuki Zomi tribes and the majority Meitei community left more than 70 people dead, the state’s 10 Kuki-Zomi MLAs demanded “a separate administration under the Constitution

A Kuki homeland

• The demand for a separate “Kukiland” dates back to the late 1980s, when the first and largest of the Kuki-Zomi insurgent groups, the Kuki National Organisation (KNO), came into being.
• In 2012, Kuki State Demand Committee (KSDC) announced a movement for Kukiland.
• The territory of “Kukiland” included the Sadar Hills (which surround the Imphal valley on three sides), the Kuki-dominated Churachandpur district, Chandel, which has a mix of Kuki and Naga populations, and even parts of Naga-dominated Tamenglong and Ukhrul
• The Kukiland demand is rooted in the idea of the Zale’n-gam, or ‘land of freedom’. They were brought from the Kuki-Chin hills of Burma by the British political agent and settled around the Imphal valley to protect the Manipur kingdom from the plundering Naga raiders of the north.
• According to the KNO, the Zale’n-gam included the area up to the Chindwin river in Myanmar and covered the bordering regions of India, the areas around the Nantalit river in northern Myanmar, and stretched to the Chin state in the south.
• In India, the Kuki homeland included the hill districts of Manipur, including the Naga areas, Kanjang, Akhen, Phek, and parts of Dimapur in Nagaland, Karbi-Anglong, North Cachar Hills, and Halflong in Assam, and Tripura, as well as parts of the Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh.

About Kuki Tribe:

• The Kuki people are an ethnic group in the southeastern part of Mizoram and Myanmar.
• The Kuki constitute one of several hill tribeswithin India, Bangladesh, and Myanmar.
• In Northeast India, they are present in all states except Arunachal Pradesh
• The Chin peopleof Myanmar and the Mizo people of Mizoram are kindred tribes of the Kukis. Collectively, they are termed the Zo people.