Hours after his arrest, the house of Huirem Herodas Meitei, the prime accused in the Manipur sexual assault video case, was Thursday set on fire by a group of women in his village.
The 32-year-old Herodas, hailing from Pechi Awang Leikai village, is the prime accused among the four people who were arrested for parading naked and sexually assaulting two women from the Kuki-Zomi community on May 4 in Thoubal district of Manipur. The identities of the other three are yet to be disclosed.
On learning about Herodas’ arrest, the women folk of Petchi village converged and headed to the house of the accused after a brief discussion amongst themselves. The group of women started vandalising the house of the accused and set it on fire.
“Be it Meitei or other communities, as a woman, outraging a woman’s dignity is not acceptable. We cannot allow such a person to be in our society. It’s a shame to the entire Meitei community,” said a Meira Paibi leader. Meira Paibis or “women torch bearers” are a senior women-led activist group with no rigid hierarchy, structure, or overt political leanings.
Though the incident took place over two months ago, it captured national attention after a short video of it started doing rounds on social media earlier this week, prompting outrage.
Chief Minister N Biren Singh, facing calls for resignation amid pressure from the public, said that the police action was delayed due to issues with the identification of the culprits. “There were over 6,000 FIRs even as the violence continued. Police were trying to identify case when the video surfaced. As soon as we got hold of the video, we could identify the culprits and action was taken immediately and we arrested two persons, including the main culprit,” he said.
Since early May, two tribal groups in Manipur — the valley-dwelling majority Meiteis and hills-dwelling Kuki-Zomis — have been in conflict over the old Meitei demand for inclusion in the list of Scheduled Tribes (STs).
