The Manipur government has postponed a training programme for census officials in Imphal West amid protests demanding that a National Register of Citizens (NRC) be conducted before the Census. The training was scheduled to begin on August 28 and is part of preparations for the first phase of the Census, which begins today, August 20.
The postponement comes as protests over the NRC demand intensify across the state. Educational institutions have been ordered to remain closed for three days from August 20, while the Campaign for Just and Fair Delimitation (JFD) has called for a boycott of government offices. The protests have involved rallies, road blockades, clashes, and other disruptions in parts of the Imphal Valley.
What are protestors demanding and why?
The NRC is a register intended to identify people who are recognised as Indian citizens. It is different from the Census, which counts and collects information about the population, while an NRC is concerned with establishing citizenship.
This distinction is at the centre of the current protests. The Census is being conducted across India in phases, and preparations have already begun in Manipur.
Protesters, however, want the government to conduct an NRC exercise in the state before the Census. They argue that population figures could be affected by people whom they believe have entered Manipur illegally, particularly from neighbouring Myanmar.
They therefore want citizenship and residency records to be established first and the population to be counted afterwards.
However, the question of who is a migrant and who is an indigenous resident is highly contested, particularly because communities living on both sides of the India-Myanmar border share ethnic ties.
When did Manipur’s NRC demand begin?
The demand for an NRC in Manipur has its roots in concerns raised by valley-based student unions and civil society groups in the 1980s and 1990s over undocumented migration from neighbouring Myanmar. An unchecked influx, they argued, could alter the state’s demographic balance, affect indigenous land rights, and influence political representation.
The demand became an official government position in August 2022, when the Manipur Legislative Assembly passed a resolution urging the Centre to establish a State Population Commission and implement an NRC in the state. The Manipur State Population Commission was subsequently constituted in February 2023, and the Assembly again sought implementation of the NRC in March 2024.
The issue gained further political importance after the 2023 ethnic conflict, as questions around migration, identity, population and political representation became more closely tied to Manipur’s wider tensions. In March 2025, BJP MP Leishemba Sanajaoba also raised the demand in Parliament for an NRC with a 1951 base year before delimitation.
Civil society groups favour 1951 because it marks India’s first post-independence Census and NRC compilation, offering a historical baseline to identify native residents and prevent post-1951 migration from altering electoral representation.
In June 2026, groups began publicly demanding that the NRC be updated before any Census or demographic exercise, while several civil society organisations pressed the Governor on the issue in July. The demand has now escalated into the ongoing protests over Census 2027.
How is the current protest linked to delimitation?
The JFD has also called for demographic changes to be properly established before delimitation, which involves redrawing electoral constituencies based largely on population.
Protesters fear that if population figures are calculated without first addressing their concerns over undocumented migration, those figures could eventually influence the distribution of political constituencies.
The issue is even more complicated because the ethnic conflict has displaced thousands of people. Many residents are still living away from their original homes, including in relief camps, raising questions about how they should be counted during the Census.
What happens next?
The Manipur government has backed the demand for an NRC and will send a delegation of MLAs to New Delhi to discuss the issue with central leaders. The delegation will seek support for updating the NRC in Manipur before the Census.
