Informing that the building was just a few hundred metres from the official bungalow of chief minister N Biren Singh, security sources said that the abandoned house belonged to the former Chief Secretary of Goa, and first IAS officer of Manipur late Thangkhopao Kipgen. Mr Kipgen died on March 3, 2005, and the house had been occupied by his family. Mr Kipgen belonged to the Kuki community.
The Imphal West Superintendent of Police in a statement said that an abandoned house near “Kuki Inn, Old Lambulane… was gutted by fire. Immediately, teams of Imphal West Police and fire trucks rushed to the spot and doused the fire… The first floor of the house was partially gutted.”
“The exact cause of the fire is not known,” the police said in the statement, adding a case has been filed to look into the “facts and circumstances” including short-circuit. “… Efforts are on to arrest culprits, if any,” the police said in the statement.
The building that caught fire is in the same complex as the main office of the Kuki Inpi, a civil society group of the Kuki tribes that has been supporting the call by another Churachandpur-based Kuki group called the Indigenous Tribal Leaders Forum (ITLF) for a “separate administration” carved out of Manipur.
The incident also came close on the heels of fresh violence igniting in Manipur’s Jiribam district, bordering Assam, between the valley-dominant Meitei community and the hill-dominant Hmar tribes.
In the second incident, an irate mob set on fire two trucks of Bharatiya Infra Project limited at Tronglaobi in Bishnupur district, bordering Kuki-Zo-dominated Churachandpur district. Security sources said that the incident occurred around 3.30 pm, when four trucks of the private company were heading towards Singhat in Churachandpur carrying construction materials.
Police said that two of the four trucks were set on fire. A team from the Moirang police station rescued the remaining trucks, which were later escorted to Imphal, police added.
