Manipur violence trauma surfaces in children’s drawings at relief camps

Imphal: Children displaced by the ethnic violence in Manipur are expressing their trauma through stark drawings that depict burning homes, gunmen with rifles, bodies lying on the ground and even people hanging from trees, according to a report by The Times of India.

In one sketch described in the report, a man hangs from a tree with his neck twisted, while a house burns nearby. On a ridge above, four figures stand with rifles pointed downward. Bodies lie below, one face down beside a bicycle, another circled in red. The sketch is largely in graphite, with only the blood coloured.

The artist was a 10-year-old Meitei boy living at the Trade & Expo Centre relief camp in Lamboikhongnangkhong in Imphal West. He drew the scene in pencil and ink in August 2024 after volunteers distributed paper and crayons to children and asked them to “draw what you feel”. Mats were spread wall-to-wall in the camp, where children sat in narrow rows after their school year was suspended.


Across Manipur, in camps set up in colleges, government halls and community buildings, from Ideal Girls’ College in Akampat to classrooms in Kangpokpi and temporary shelters in Sajiwa, children responded similarly. Pages that once held arithmetic and handwriting exercises now show houses on fire, bodies lying still, figures running and smoke stretching across hills.

One drawing titled “Present Situation” featured protest slogans, territorial claims and armed personnel alongside crowds and raised flags.

Keisham Pradipkumar, chairperson of the Manipur Commission for Protection of Child Rights, told TOI that the images were not fictional. “These aren’t reports. They are memories replaying themselves,” he said, describing the drawings as “spatial memories” impressions mapped onto terrain. “Many of these children saw what they were drawing. They are not inventing dramatic scenes.”

In one camp, a boy drew a house with its roof on fire. He erased and redrew the door twice before adding a heavy bolt across it, pressing so hard that the paper tore at the edge. When a counsellor asked him why, he said the door needed to be stronger this time.

Another sketch showed gunmen firing from a slope at smaller figures below. At the bottom stood a house with a single oversized padlock, dwarfing the door. The child said he had drawn the lock large so no one could break in.

In yet another drawing, a woman stood at the edge of flames with her arms extended, surrounded by smaller figures, some upright, some lying down. Flames were evenly spread across rooftops, with red pooling where bodies fell, while the rest of the image remained monochrome.

Official state figures estimate that around 18,000 displaced children are living in relief camps. Child rights advocates place the number closer to 25,000, including those staying in rented accommodation, with relatives, or outside the state.

The drawings, Pradipkumar said, underline the urgent need for sustained mental health support for displaced children.

(With inputs from TOI)