For over a decade, the state government and its agencies were nothing more than a myth here. Across hundreds of square kilometres of virgin forest spread out over almost inaccessible hills, small pockets of villagers knew the only authorities were at the rebel camp in Khanpi. The police and the government officers had long since left.

The militants called the Henglep sub-division of Churachandpur district a part of their “Liberated Zone’’. Secluded Churachandpur district, located in the hills of Manipur and bordering Myanmar and Mizoram, was perfect for the Valley-based insurgent groups to run their training camps and host their armed cadres. The same went for Parbung, Thanlon, Thinghat sub-divisions, where the civil administration had all but retreated. Now, a series of concerted operations by the security forces over the past year has ensured that the situation has taken a turn for the better, partially at least.

For a start, there is civil police presence in the outlying areas of the district since the past 11 months, says Churachandpur SP J D Lhato. Earlier, registering a police complaint would mean trudging to the district HQ that’s about 265 km from Parbung on an almost non-existent NH-150 Imphal-Aizawl.

On the civil administration side, district government authorities on condition of anonymity say there are fully functional SDO offices in Parbung, Thanlon and Henglep. “All these have been established since February-March this year, where previously there was nothing. Now, a lot of needs can be addressed at the local level, instead of at the district HQ.’’

Much of the civil administration in the affected areas was withdrawn to Churachandpur town following the Kuki-Paite clashes in 1996-97. Sources say most of the offices here had been burnt down. While important departments like the agriculture and veterinary have been established now, other key departments like the PWD, PHED, electricity, don’t have anyone posted there. “But the situation has definitely improved, and PDS items like rice and kerosene have begun reaching these areas since July this year,’’ sources add.

The 7/8 Gorkha Rifles battalion, which cleared Henglep, took almost a year-and-a-half to do so, says the CO, Col A Joshi. “There were large camps of Assam-based militants in the area, mainly at Khanpi, and well-established for over a decade, so dislodging them took some time. The Valley-based militants came here after the Naga-Kuki clashes in the early Nineties to curb the NSCN I-M influence. Although the camps have been cleared now, we still have at least three skirmishes with militants every month.’’

THE presence of insurgents is by no means over. That’s made clear at Thinghat, bordering Myanmar, where the Army has completed phase one of a model village with solar lighting and an 80-bed hostel with library. Recently one jawan attached to 9 Assam Rifles was killed and several other personnel were injured when they went to intercept a militant tax-collection party that was making the rounds of neighbouring villages.

The presence of the 9 AR means villagers like Hankholian are breathing easier these days, but the new chief of Thinghat village still remembers the year 1999 when militants took over his village. “They would enter our houses, cook and eat there. Sometimes even up to 70 militants at one time. Mostly, they would never pay for the chickens or other livestock that they would take from our farms. It was too much.’’ This, he says, continued till end-2005, when the Assam Rifles arrived, and in a week, the militants were gone.

In Parbung, headquarters of Tipaimukh sub-division, transiting militants once called the shots. Hrilthankung Sielhnam, headmaster of the local school here, says militants would often take food without paying for it. When the 13 Dogra battalion arrived to clear the area early this year, militants backed off from this dominantly Hmar area only after putting up strong opposition.

The Hmars here allege that militants gang-raped 21 girls in Parbung and Lungthulien villages in mid-January, and that despite a judicial probe by the Rajkhowa Commission, no justice has come their way. Meanwhile, Aizawl seems nearer than Imphal at 200 km, and the ethnic drift here is towards the Lushais in Mizoram. “We need a bridge over the river to Aizawl, and medical care,’’ insists Sielhnam.

In most of these areas, Military Civil Action MCA, is supplementing the civic administration while it gets its act together after years of rust, building roads, providing basic medicines, schools and community halls.

Senior defence authorities admit the area is far from being totally sanitised, citing a porous border with Myanmar as the main cause for militant influx. Most Manipuri insurgent outfits have their camps in Myanmar, and the proposed Indo-Myanmar cooperation on this front could well pave the way for a speedier improvement of living conditions for the hill tribes of Manipur.