The Kuki-Zo Council (KZC) on Monday (December 1, 2025) expressed “strong objections” to what it called “renewed attempts” by the Manipur Government to operationalise a decades-old law that takes away land ownership rights of tribal chiefs in the Hill areas of Manipur.
The KZC, a coalition of Kuki-Zo civil society organisations set up in the shadow of the ongoing ethnic disturbance in the State, cited a letter dated November 24 this year from the Home Department of the Manipur Government.
As per this letter, the Home Department had asked authorities in the Land Resources and Tribal Affairs and Hill areas departments to take up this issue at the “earliest”, based on a representation from the Manipur Meetei Tribes Union (MMTU)
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The representation from the MMTU called for the implementation of the Manipur Hill Areas (Acquisition of Chiefs’ Rights) Act, 1967. This law took away the traditional land ownership of Scheduled Tribe chiefs in the hill areas of the State and stopped the hereditary transfer of land ownership from one chief to the other. While the law received Presidential Assent in the same year, it was never operationalised.
