New Delhi: Not at all a stranger to incessant insurgent violence in the last seven decades, the February 1, 2021 coup by the military junta has only exacerbated matters with pro-democracy activists joining extant Ethnic Armed Organisations (EAOs) by the hordes.
According to reports sourced from locals, a large number of youths are taking up the gun in huge numbers to fight the military junta.
What has made it easy for the people to organize themselves militarily is the presence of numerous insurgencies for the last seven decades.
The most major ethnic group is represented by an ‘Ethnic Armed Organisation’ (EAO) that has been fighting the Burman-dominated ‘Tatmadaw’ (Myanmar military).
These EOAs are organized along ethnic lines with their demands ranging from self-determination and complete independence to enhanced autonomy.
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On Thursday, the repressive violence perpetrated by the ‘Tatmadaw’ reached the Indian border when six police officers were killed during an attack on the Nan Phar Lone police outpost in the Sagaing region’s Tamu township.
While the politically dominant community in Myanmar is the ‘Barmar’ (Burmans), the insurgent outfits are found across the length and breadth of the country. Some of these insurgent groups are of Arakanese, Shans, Kayens, Kachins, Rakhines, Chins, Rohingyas and the Wa communities that have a ready crop of volunteers ready for military service at any given point of time.
ETV Bharat had reported on March 19 how the pro-democracy movement in Myanmar, spearheaded by the ‘Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw’ (CRPH), has sought military services of 10-20 able-bodied men from each village from across the country with the aim of forming a federal army to combat the ‘Tatmadaw’.
Thousands of pro-democracy supporters and activists from a spectrum of society including policemen, firemen, students, government employees etc have crossed over the India-Myanmar international border to places in Mizoram and Manipur.
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Many people in these two states belonging to the Kuki-Chin-Mizo ethnic groups share common ethnic, linguistic, cultural and kinship ties with the Chin people inhabiting the Sagaing state in western Myanmar where they have been heartily welcomed.
Myanmarese media reported of many citizens responding to the ‘Tatmadaw’s deadly crackdowns “with defensive actions by using traditional homemade firearms, homemade gas pressure guns, handmade bows and arrows and Molotov cocktails”.
Till now, about 550 civilians including children have died in the military’s crackdowns and raids even as people across the country have raised a nationwide banner of peaceful protest in defiance of the ‘Tatmadaw’.
After a decade long experiment with democracy, the apprehensive military effected a coup on February 1, 2021, after an electoral verdict overwhelmingly favoured the Daw Aung San Suu Suu Kyi-led National Democratic League (NLD) in November 2020.
The NLD bagged 396 seats of the total 476, while the junta-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) got just 33.
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