Steering Committee on Vaiphei IDPs Expresses Displeasure Over Plans To Close Relief Camps

The Steering Committee on Vaiphei IDPs has expressed displeasure and dismay over the government plan to close Relief Camps spread over different districts by December 2025 by sending the IDPS back the IDPs to their original villages/homes.

The Committee issued a release on Saturday stating that the proposed plan of the government to close the relief camps was disclosed by the Chief Secretary of Manipur Puneet Kumar Goel during his recent visit to Churachandpur district.

The committee stated that such decision of the government is unfortunate and ill-timed being bereft of any sound logic considering the overall law and order situation of the state.

Maintaining a strong reservation in this regard and strongly opposing the move to roll back the Relief Camps, the committee stated that there is need to look into the plight and suffering of the IDPs more closely and efficiently than ever before whether there's any drop-out/half-hearted measures of the relief operation, be it campers or non-campers satisfying that they are proven displaced persons whose villages/houses were burnt during the peak of the communal violence.

Stating that any plan to send the IDPs back or close Relief Camps without any alternatives will prove suicidal/disastrous unless there's real peace in place, the committee added that mere excuses that the situation is limping back to normal is a death trap for the innocent people who had already suffered the hardest.

Not only those who are in the Camps there are a number of people outside the Camps renting houses on their own whose conditions are equally bad but they are not entitled to any relief measures so far extended by the government despite their houses being burnt, stated the release.

Reiterating their stand, the Committee strongly urges the government to reconsider its plan to roll back the Relief Camps and rather address the relief and rehabilitation of IDPs in its entirety- all encompassing, more friendly, inclusive, efficient, responsive and above all more transparent a system until peace is struck verifiably.