A little less than two years into the ethnic violence involving the Kuki-Zo tribal groups and the Meitei community that hit Manipur (in May 2023), BJP Chief Minister Nongthombam Biren Singh quitted his post on Sunday, February 9.

Singh handed his resignation letter to Governor Ajay Kumar Bhalla at the Raj Bhavan. He was accompanied by state BJP president A Sharda, BJP’s Northeast In-charge Sambit Patra and approximately 19 MLAs.

His resignation came a day after he told the PTI in an interview that his government “has been making all possible efforts to restore peace and to ensure that people live together peacefully as before.”

He (a Meitei) the has been widely blamed for the continuation of the violence and the failure to broker a peace from a neutral ground, and even in his own party, has been slowly losing popularity.

Demands for his resignation from within his own ranks too have grown louder over the course of the last year. BJP MLAs from the Valley have queued up before the party’s central leadership—including the Prime Minister’s Office in October 2024—over the months, seeking his replacement.

The immediate trigger for the resignation seemed to be the Budget session of the Manipur Assembly that was set to begin on Monday. With their appeals for a leadership change going unheard, dissident MLAs prepared to back a no-confidence motion that the Congress said was likely to move.

More than 250 people have been killed and thousands rendered homeless, and this continues. On the night of Saturday, a few hours before Singh’s quitting, unidentified gunmen in vehicles looted arms from an India Reserve Battalion outpost in in the Kakmayai area of Thoubal district.