IMPHAL, September 12: The Joint Action Committee formed in connection with the passing of the bills in its emergency meeting held today at the JAC Information Center office has unanimously resolved to declare public boycott on all the elected tribal MLAs who have refused to feel the pulse of the tribal populace and declined to resign in spite of the mounting pressure from the general public to do so.
Informing this in a statement, the JAC reiterated that All Tribal Students`™ Union, Manipur (ATSUM) had made an appeal to all the tribal MLAs on August 30 to abstain from the special session of the Manipur State Assembly wherein the three bills namely the Protection of Manipur People Bill, 2015; Manipur Land Revenue & Land Reforms (Seventh Amendment) Bill, 2015 and Manipur Shops & Establishments (Second Amendment) Bill, 2015 were intended to be passed.
However, the appeal went unheeded, it said.
The statement said that the tribal apex bodies Kuki Innpi, Hmar Inpui and Zomi Council in their meeting on September 1 had unanimously given an ultimatum to the Hill Areas Committee to convene a meeting at the earliest and take appropriate steps to either repeal the bills or insert exceptional clause in it within ten days.
However, no response in any form was received from the Hill Areas Committee till date, it lamented.
The tribal apex bodies in their meeting on September 2 had resolved that the JAC formed on September 2 at KKL Complex shall be the forum to spearhead all issues including the demand for a separate administration for the hill peoples of Manipur and that it shall have the full backing of the tribal apex bodies, the statement maintained.
It further reiterated that the JAC in its emergency meeting on September 7 had resolved to support the ten-day ultimatum given by the tribal apex bodies and agrred to impose public boycott on all the elected tribal MLAs if no desirable response is received from the HAC by midnight of September 10 or if they do not tender their resignation but no response of any kind was received from the HAC till date.
Stating that there were rumors of the resignation of some of the tribal MLAs, the JAC in the statement claimed that a media team was sent to verify the same today but failed to get any satisfactory response from the tribal MLAs.
There is no intimation or communication to the tribal apex bodies, ATSUM or the JAC from any of the MLAs regarding their resignation, the statement said.