On Sunday, June 4, an ambulance escorting an injured child along with his mother and a relative was set ablaze by a mob in West Imphal of Manipur. The fire resulted in the death of the eight-year-old boy, his mother and a relative.
The incident transpired on Sunday evening in Iroisemba, while the child was being taken to a hospital by his mother and a relative in Imphal after sustaining a bullet wound in his head during a shoot-out.
The police have identified the three deceased persons as eight-year-old Tonsing Hangsing, his 45-year-old mother Meena Hangsing, and Lydia Lourembam, aged 37.
An Assam Rifles officer confirmed the incident, stating that security had been tightened in and around the camp.
Tonsing, the son of a tribal man, and his Meitei mother were reportedly sheltering at an Assam Rifles relief camp at Kangchup. A gunfight broke out in the area on the evening of June 4, and although Tonsing was inside the camp, he was injured by a bullet.
A senior Assam Rifles officer immediately contacted Imphal police and arranged for an ambulance. “Because the mother was from the majority community, it was decided to take the child by road to the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences in Imphal”, he said.
The ambulance was escorted by the Assam Rifles for a few kilometres before being taken over by the local police. The ambulance was reportedly set ablaze by locals in Isoisemba at 6.30 PM. The three people in the vehicle were killed and the dead bodies have not been recovered so far.
According to an Indian Express report, the Meitei woman was married to a Kuki man. A senior official said that only some bones were recovered from the ambulance that was set on fire. An FIR has been registered in the matter with murder charges added.
Gin Hangsing, a relative of the victims and a resident of the village said, “The women and children of our village had been staying at an Assam Rifles outpost nearby for the past month while the men have been doing village defence work. On Sunday, Tomshing was shot in the head from a distance, we don’t know if it was a stray bullet or if it was directed at him.”
Manipur saw massive ethnic violence earlier this month following a ‘Tribal Solidarity March’ organised by tribal groups on May 3 to protest against the Meitei community’s demand for Scheduled Tribe (ST) status. They were also protesting against the eviction of Kuki villages from reserve forest land. According to the CM and Meitei groups, most of those Kuki people are from Myanmar.
