Imphal: The Manipur High Court on Wednesday ordered the removal of a paragraph from its order that directed the state government to consider the inclusion of the Meitei community in the scheduled tribe list.
On March 27 order, by a single-judge bench of MV Muralidharan, who was the high court’s chief justice at the time, was passed on a petition by members of the Meitei Tribes Union. Several organisations led by the All Manipur Tribal Union had then moved the High Court on May 3, seeking permission to file a third-party appeal against the March order.
The High Court order of March 27 last year, which was made public in April, played a key role in triggering the ongoing ethnic conflict between the Meitei and the tribal Kuki-Zo communities in Manipur.
The direction had led to widespread violence in the State, leading the Supreme Court to eventually take a suo motu cognisance of the issue.
In October last year, a division bench of the Manipur High Court agreed to hear an appeal filed against the controversial order.
The appeal was moved by the All Manipur Tribal Union and various groups who argued that groups associated with the rights of the tribal community were not a party to the writ petition in which the 2023 direction was passed.
The original petitioners – in whose case the direction was passed by Justice Muralidaran, filed a review plea before the High Court, in which the Meitei petitioners submitted that an “innocuous” direction in the March 2023 order may have to be modified considering the delicate nature of the issue.
The review petitioners still sought for the State to consider the inclusion of Meiteis in the ST list, but added that it was completely up to the wisdom of the State to take a call on the issue.
On Wednesday, Justice Golmei Gaiphulshillu of the High Court said that the paragraph in the order needs to be reviewed. “I am satisfied and of the view that the direction given in Paragraph No. 17 (iii) of the Hon’ble Single Judge dated 27.03.2023 needs to be reviewed, as the direction is against the observation made in the Constitution Bench of the Hon’ble Supreme Court,” the court noted.
