Border Fencing Non-Negotiable: Manipur CM’s New Advisor
Lt Gen Nishikanta Singh with PM Narendra Modi (Image X.com)
Manipur CM’s advisor Lt Gen Nishikanta Singh calls India-Myanmar border fencing inevitable, backs reformed Free Movement Regime
By NIRENDRA DEV
New Delhi, March 10, 2026 — The BJP-led Manipur government has once again made its position unambiguous — border fencing along the India-Myanmar frontier is non-negotiable.
“Border fencing has to be done whether people like it or not,” declared Lt Gen Nishikanta Singh (Retd), the newly appointed advisor-coordination to Manipur Chief Minister Yumnam Khemchand Singh, speaking at a seminar on Security Challenges to the North East: Assessment and Way Forward in New Delhi on Tuesday.
In the same breath, he also backed a reformed Free Movement Regime. “The FMR in a new form has to be enforced — because we cannot continue saying that during the time of Aurangzeb we used to cross over from north India to Myanmar,” he said, invoking a pointed historical analogy to underscore the urgency of modernising the decades-old border arrangement.
Delimitation, NRC and the Politics of Numbers
Lt Gen Nishikanta also addressed the politically charged linkages between immigration, demography, and electoral representation in Manipur. “Every tribe, every group will want more seats in the state assembly because in a democracy, power lies in numbers,” he said, flagging that demands for delimitation, a National Register of Citizens (NRC), and the effective implementation of Special Intensive Revision (SIR) are among the most pressing challenges confronting the state.
“People do not want census until NRC is done,” he added, capturing the deep-seated anxiety over demographic change that continues to fuel Manipur’s political tensions. He also noted that deforestation by encroaching populations was an environmental challenge compounding the security situation — noting wryly that millions of trees had been planted in Manipur, though how many had survived was uncertain.
Assam Rifles: More Than a Paramilitary Force
DG Assam Rifles Lt Gen Vikas Lakhera, also addressing the seminar, made a forceful case for the unique role his force plays in India’s Northeast. “We are not just another paramilitary force. We are deeply ingrained in the social fabric of the far east of the country. Our troops speak every local dialect,” he said.
Underlining a philosophy of people-centric counterinsurgency, he added: “Battle cannot be won by the gun — the gun is to protect. The battle has to be won by many other things.” He also highlighted Assam Rifles’ outreach to northeastern students in Delhi, including the annual Unity Utsav attended by 3,000 to 4,000 students.
FMR and the 1,643-km Border
India and Myanmar share a 1,643-kilometre land border across Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland, and Arunachal Pradesh. The Free Movement Regime, established in 1950, originally allowed residents to cross up to 40 kilometres into each other’s territory without documents — a provision narrowed to 16 kilometres in 2004. The push to fence the border and overhaul the FMR was formally announced by Union Home Minister Amit Shah in Guwahati on January 20, 2024.
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