Laughter and singing re-verberated through a girls or-phanage in the northeastern Indian state of Manipur, as violence raged on the streets outside.
“Not that we are not affe-cted by the violence, but we feel safe and secure here,” Anjali Khouchung, a 12-year-old resident of Snehabhavan (“Home of Love”), told Global Sisters Report.
The ethnic violence in Manipur, which began May 3, is a conflict between the Meitei community, who are Hindus and the majority community of the state, and the Kuki, a minority tribe who are mostly Christians. Nearly 200 civili-ans, mostly Kukis, were killed in the violence. Many churches and villages were also burned.
The violence was still ra-ging when GSR visited the Manipur capital of Imphal the last week of September.
The state government had cut off the internet but, pre-suming the situation had im-proved, restored it after four months – only for it to be disconnected again as fresh violence hit Imphal following social media rumors about the murder of two students of the Meitei. The state government also reimposed indefinite cur-few in Imphal, the capital city.
“Our sisters take good care of us here,” said Khouchung, a member of the Naga, a mino-rity tribe in Manipur that is not involved in the conflict.
The sisters had to send the Kuki students back from their Imphal center for security rea-sons, as the majority commu-nity of Meiteis were targeting Kukis, but sisters continued to take care of the orphaned Kuki children in refugee camps thro-ugh their outreach programs.