Manipur: Miscreants torch a newly constructed school building in Moreh

Imphal: Unknown arsonists on Wednesday night set ablaze a school building causing major damage to the newly constructed school building at T Minou village in Manipur’s Tengoupal district sharing borders with Myanmar on the south, officials said on Thursday.

Properties worth crores of rupees were destroyed in the devastating fire, official reports said.

The fire was detected in the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya (JNV) between border pillars number 75 and 76, at T Minou (Motha) village, about 7 km from Moreh, the sub-divisional headquarters of the Tengnoupal district at around 9 pm on Wednesday.

The school building is awaiting its inauguration.

This education institute building is constructed near the 5 Assam Rifles deployed in the area and it is to be occupied by the 96 Border Security Forces, Battalion.

Upon reaching the information of getting afire the school building, a fire tender from the Moreh Fire Services rushed.

However, the fire tender was unable to reach its destination after a large number of stones and woods blocked the road en route to the burning school buildings, fire service sources confirmed.

The suspected Kuki militants might have taken the arsoning works, official reports said.

Details of properties destroyed in the fire are yet to be assessed owing to the hostile atmosphere in the location at least at present, the report added.

The burning down of the JNV has come when the government is preparing to open the said JNV which is a system of central schools for talented students predominantly from rural areas in India, targeting gifted students who lack access to accelerated learning due to financial, social, and rural disadvantages.

Meanwhile, a tea shop belonging to one Jola Hmar was reduced to ashes at Lungreijong in Kalinagar ward number four of Jiribam district of Manipur on Wednesday night.

The cause of the fire is yet to be established, Manipur fire service sources added.