The reported overlap in the ongoing census ex ercise, in which villages in Churachandpur district are enumerated under Bishnupur district, smacks of something radically wrong within the government. Assuming the enumerators were ignorant about the district boundaries,
which is the best case scenario, they should be reprimanded befittingly. If the enumerators were supplied list of villages they should cover and these villages figured in their list, the government must come up with an explanation. Otherwise, such gaffe is likely to be misinterpreted as a scheme to annex one district by another, which in an ethnically sensitive state like Manipur could blow up into an undesirable and avoidable crisis.

The government must issue an unambiguous statement as to what exactly led to such an overlapping of functions between the administrative machineries of the two districts. This is not a lone case where the government must come clean. It should also explain the reasons behind collection of revenue for certain areas in Sadar Hills at Sekmai. If the government has been acting a puppet in the hands of fanatic Manipuris, (those that advocate merging certain areas of Sadar Hills into Imphal West, et al forcibly), then, such a puppet government must go.It is precisely such chauvinistic and parochial policies that often strike a crippling blow to the state's emotional and territorial integrity.

Manipur is an ethnic mosaic where mutual respect between various communities is most essential for
peaceful co-existence. If the government has, either by acts of commission or omission, fail to uphold this essential principle, it would be too late when each community begins to seek alternative routes of assertion. The protest by tribals of Churachandpur is in the right spirit. It manifests their continuing faith in the government. The government must seize the opportunity and prove that it is trustworthy. If the government fails to come up with a satisfactory explanation and acceptable redressal for the above faux pas, the day may not be far when its writ runs only within the valley districts.

The old British trick of re-aligning territories on the pretext of administrative convenience is no longer acceptable and can prove to be disastrous in an ethno-sensitized political environment like Manipur.
Pragmatic political leadership demands treading with caution and sensitizing the governmentís machinery
of these complexities.

A peopleís government should concentrate on minimizing poverty, not on minimizing one district's territory to benefit another. It should work to maximize revenue collection, not to centralize the process. Government in a democracy should work for the people, not for a particular section of the people at the expense of other sections. Any government that violates these norms jeopardizes its legitimacy and authority.