Four Kuki villagers killed in Tamenglong and Noney on Sahnit Ni

Four Kuki villagers were killed in two attacks in Manipur's Tamenglong and Noney districts on Sunday, 13 September, the day the community marks Sahnit Ni, or Black Day, for the Kuki-Naga killings of the early 1990s. A six-year-old boy was shot and taken to Silchar Medical College in Assam. A woman who was with the second group was reported missing.

The first shooting was around 4am to 5.30am at L Tollen village in Tamenglong, near NH-37, the road from Imphal to Jiribam. Lhingzangai Singsit, also spelled Lhingjangai in police and village accounts, died at the house. She was in her early forties and a mother of five. Her husband, Seineh Singsit, was hit and died on the way to hospital or shortly after. Their youngest son, named Henminsang in the village statement, was in a serious condition in Silchar.

The second attack was about 3.20pm to 3.30pm at Longpi Kuki village under Nungba police station in Noney. Julie Singson, also reported as Julie Gangte, and Roel Gangte, also named Thangvel Gangte, were shot while collecting household goods, according to the Western Village Volunteers and local bodies. Julie was said to be pregnant. Another woman in the group was not found.

Who the village authorities named

The L Tollen village authority accused cadres of the NSCN-IM and ZUF(K), the Zeliangrong United Front. It called the shooting a planned attempt to drive Kuki-Zo villagers off land in the hills and linked it to the Greater Nagalim claim. No group issued a public claim. Police said an investigation had started. Chief Minister Y Khemchand Singh called attacks on civilians cowardly and sent condolences.

Kuki bodies issued a 24-hour ultimatum, announced a 24-hour economic blockade, and warned of an indefinite shutdown if the government did not act. Kuki Inpi JTN said it would not take the bodies for funeral rites until it saw a response. Saikul MLA Kimneo Hangshing condemned both attacks.

Name spellings differ across PTI, India Today and village statements. The places do not. Tollen in Tamenglong and Longpi in Noney are Kuki settlements in a belt that has seen Naga-Kuki tension sit beside the larger Meitei-Kuki war that began in May 2023. That war has a public toll of at least 306 dead, 49 missing and large displacement. Sunday's dead are a separate hill-district track reopening on the anniversary of an older one.

Why 13 September is not an ordinary date

Sahnit Ni remembers Kuki dead from the 1990s conflict with Naga groups. Holding the attacks on that date is why village statements reached for systematic and ethnic cleansing in the same paragraph as the 4am shooting. Those words are allegations. The facts that can be stood up tonight are four dead, one child in Silchar, one woman missing, two villages, no claim of responsibility, and a blockade clock already running.

NH-37 matters because Tollen sits on the road that still connects the valley to Jiribam when other routes are closed. A shooting there is a security problem for the highway as well as for the household. Longpi's afternoon attack, on people out for supplies, is the pattern that empties a village faster than a night raid on a single house.

The next official paper that counts is the FIR and the hospital bulletin from Silchar. The next political paper is whether the 24-hour ultimatum produces extra deployment in Tamenglong and Noney or another shutdown in the hills.