Calling the proposed corridor a “Drug Road,” the FNCC claims it will become a hub for narcotics and arms trafficking from Myanmar.
BY PC Bureau
In a move that could trigger serious tensions with the Kuki-Zo community, the Foothills Naga Co-ordination Committee (FNCC) has warned it will dismantle and uproot all bunkers, makeshift structures, and gates allegedly built illegally on its ancestral lands along the so-called German/Tiger Road if authorities fail to intervene immediately.
In a statement, the FNCC condemned the proposed road as “Drug Road’ and said the project would cut directly through the heart of Naga ancestral territory. The FNCC expressed alarm over reports that the proposal has received tacit approval from the highest levels of the Government of India via the Ministry of DoNER. The committee argued that such endorsement grants “dangerous legitimacy” to a plan that threatens law and order, as well as fragile inter-community relations in Manipur.
READ: BJP Accuses Sonia Gandhi of Pre-Citizenship Voter Entry
Rejecting claims that the road project is for development, the FNCC described it instead as a “calculated and sinister ploy” to enable organised criminal activities. According to the group, the corridor would primarily serve the interests of “a small cabal of Kuki militant leaders” working with certain Kuki civil society organisation leaders, and would become a key route for trafficking narcotics and illegal arms from Myanmar into Manipur.
“The Kukis already exercise effective control over a vital national highway: NH-2, where they have systematically obstructed free movement through blockades, intimidation, and extortion… The proposed road would serve primarily the narrow, corrupt interests of a small cabal of Kuki militant leaders working hand-in-glove with complicit Kuki CSO leaders. This infrastructure would function as a logistical spine for the wholesale trafficking of narcotics and illegal arms from Myanmar into Manipur,” the FNCC stated.
The FNCC also accused Kuki groups of already exercising control over National Highway-2 through “blockades, intimidation, and extortion,” adding that the proposed road would expand their influence into Naga areas. Citing “verified data” (as reported on Reddit), the FNCC claimed that since 2017, 873 convicted drug traffickers in Manipur belong to the Kuki community, which it alleged is “the top-most group involved in the state’s illicit narcotics trade.”
READ: Opinion: Kuki Freedom Fighters and Their Forgotten Sacrifice
The committee further alleged that the Kukis generate crores of rupees daily through illegal taxation and extortion along existing highways. It warned that the planned Kangpokpi–Churachandpur corridor, passing through Naga villages, would be patrolled solely by armed Kuki militants, without any police, armed forces, or legal checkpoints, creating an unmonitored conduit for drugs, weapons, and contraband — worsening Manipur’s already volatile security situation.
The FNCC urged the state to take “immediate and decisive” action by dismantling all illegal installations along the German/Tiger Road, warning that failure to do so would compel the committee to take matters into its own hands.
