Under the SoO agreement signed with Kuki militant outfits, cadres receive stipends, rations, accommodation, and logistical support, from the government of India.
There is a fundamental moral question that every Indian taxpayer should ask. Can a democratic government justify using public money to finance armed militant groups year after year in Manipur merely to prevent them from creating law and order problems?
Temporary financial support as part of a genuine peace process may be understandable. But when an arrangement like the Suspension of Operations (SoO) agreement, signed with Kuki militant outfits in 2008 as a temporary confidence-building measure, continues for seventeen years without a political settlement, it ceases to be merely an administrative issue. It becomes an ethical one.
Under the SoO arrangement, cadres receive stipends, rations, accommodation, and logistical support, with the cumulative expenditure running into hundreds of crores of rupees over the years. The issue is therefore no longer simply about maintaining peace. It is about whether the Government of India should sustain armed groups indefinitely with taxpayers’ money. Such scarce resources can be better deployed for education and healthcare.
This question assumes even greater significance when allegations continue to surface that Kuki outfits operating under the SoO agreement have violated the ground rules during the Meitei-Kuki ethnic conflict and, more recently, in relation to the Nagas. If the SoO agreement is repeatedly alleged to have been breached, the obvious question is whether it needs to be revisited to make it more effective or discontinued. A corollary to this is the question about the Naga peace talks, which have continued for nearly three decades since the ceasefire of 1997, and as to why similar criticism should not be directed at them?
The answer lies in the fundamental differences between the two arrangements. First, the Naga ceasefire does not require the Government of India to finance the upkeep of Naga cadres through monthly stipends, rations, accommodation, or other recurring public expenditure. The negotiations have therefore not imposed a comparable financial burden on the public exchequer. Second, the historical context is entirely different. The Naga political movement traces its origins to the political engagement between Naga representatives and the British administration before Indian independence. The present impasse in the Naga peace talks is not primarily about financial or administrative concessions but about unresolved political questions rooted in history, including the demand for recognition of Naga identity through institutions such as a separate flag and constitution. Whether one agrees with these demands or not, they arise from a political dispute that predates India’s independence.
The Suspension of Operations agreement, by contrast, was conceived as a temporary security arrangement to facilitate political dialogue and settlement. Seventeen years later, the question is no longer whether political dialogue should continue, but whether the indefinite expenditure of public funds on maintaining armed groups, who are frequently alleged to have violated the ground rules, can be justified when no tangible breakthrough appears to be in sight. It is against this backdrop that the two ceasefire arrangements operating in Northeast India deserve closer public scrutiny.
Peace agreements are intended to create the conditions for political settlement, not to become permanent financial arrangements bleeding the exchequer without any outcome. If seventeen years of public funding have failed to produce a durable political outcome, taxpayers are entitled to ask whether the present model has succeeded or failed. A democratic government owes its citizens not only transparency in expenditure but also accountability for outcomes. Public money cannot become an open-ended subsidy for armed outfits without measurable progress towards peace.
The Ministry of Home Affairs must therefore answer three simple questions: Why has the political process under the SoO agreement remained unresolved after seventeen years? What measurable outcomes justify the continued expenditure of public funds? And if repeated allegations of violations of the SoO ground rules are true, why has the agreement not been fundamentally reconsidered?
These questions are not directed against any community but rather at the Government of India. They concern the ethical use of public funds, the credibility of the peace process, and the State’s responsibility to ensure that temporary arrangements do not become permanent liabilities. Ultimately, this is not just Manipur’s question. It is India’s question.
Ngaranmi Shimray