New Delhi, India — Late on Sunday night, Chongtham Vikram Singh was troubled by loud noises outside his home in the Indian capital, where he lived with his son and wife. He climbed down the stairs, but an argument ensued with nearly a dozen men, who chased him back to the third floor of his apartment. The chase ended with 54-year-old Singh, a renowned guitarist from India’s northeastern state of Manipur, left unconscious on the stairs by the mob.
Within hours, he had died from his wounds at a nearby hospital. Singh’s killing has revived anxieties over entrenched racial discrimination and marginalisation that people from the northeastern states have long faced in the rest of India. For his friends and fans, the tragedy comes as Manipur enters a fourth year of a deadly civil war that has displaced tens of thousands in the state.
He inspired generations to pick up guitar in the land where the arms and lives are so cheap.” Singh’s tragic end, after teaching music for 20 years in the capital, is a reminder, Chingangbam said, that racism is a stark reality for thousands of domestic migrants from India’s northeast. In New Delhi, Singh gave private music classes and helped young musicians to gain a foothold. Back in Manipur, he was a rock star, the guitarist of a popular, socially conscious rock band – Eastern Dark.
The 54-year-old was among the region’s rock pioneers in the early 1980s. The Eastern Dark band’s name is also a nod to the political marginalisation of people in northeastern states, including Manipur. Our lifestyle and, geographically, every aspect of our life is dark,” Eastern Dark vocalist Heishnam Malemngangba Lokeshwar told a researcher in 2020.
Manipur has seen decades of armed rebellion, involving ethnic groups fighting Indian rule and, at times, each other. Two decades back, Singh moved to New Delhi “to make something out of life”, said Chingangbam, Singh’s friend, “to expand the horizon and opportunities as a musician”. Chingangbam remembers him as “the finest guitarist” he knew, but also as the person with the widest smile in the room, who would exchange stories during their jamming sessions.
When he was lined up to play at the music festival NH7 Weekender in 2016, Singh took him to a friend to get him a new acoustic guitar. With war at home, we just don’t have a place where we feel secure, protected.” The Delhi police have arrested eight accused, including a minor, on charges of murder, but have not commented on the motive behind the murder yet. Singh’s killing led to a wider outcry against years of marginalisation of people from the northeast in mainland India, where casual racism has become commonplace.
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