Manipur will reject those trying to “add fuel to the fire” in the state, Prime Minister Narendra Modi told the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday.

He claimed that the Centre is continuously making efforts to restore peace in the northeastern state.

The Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled state has been gripped by ethnic clashes between the tribal Kuki and the Meitei communities since May last year. The violence has left at least 225 persons dead and displaced 60,000 persons from their homes since the beginning of the clashes.

The Opposition has criticised the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance for its handling of the crisis. It has also been urging the prime minister since last year to visit the state and speak on the ethnic violence in Parliament.

On Wednesday, in his first remarks on the state during the ongoing Monsoon session, Modi said that over 11,000 first information reports have been registered and over 500 persons arrested in connection with the clashes.

“Incidents of violence are continuously reducing in Manipur,” he said during his reply to the debate on the motion of thanks on the president’s address. “Today, schools, colleges, offices and other institutions are open in the state.”

The prime minister said that the Centre and the state government were talking to all the stakeholders to restore peace. Union Home Minister Amit Shah had also visited the state, he added.

“We must rise above politics and contribute to making the situation normal there,” he said. “This is our duty.”

Modi noted that Manipur had seen a “long, social struggle” in its history.

“The roots of the struggle are very deep,” he said. The president’s rule had been previously imposed ten times in the state by the then Congress government, Modi said, adding that the Opposition party should not forget that.

Following Modi’s remarks about the state in the Rajya Sabha, the Congress questioned why Modi has still not visited Manipur.

“Today in the Rajya Sabha, after months of absolute silence on the issue, the non-biological PM made the astounding claim that the situation in Manipur is normal,” Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said on social media.

“In actuality, the situation is still tense as the MP from Inner Manipur [A Bimol Akoijam] pointed out in the Lok Sabha on 1st July. The President’s address [on June 27] too was silent on the issue.”

Ramesh also referred to Akoijam’s address in the Lok Sabha on Monday that criticised the Centre for “ignoring” Manipur amid the violence.

“Is this silence communicating to the people of the northeast and particularly Manipur that you do not matter in the Indian state’s scheme of things?” Akoijam had said. “This is not a simple absence. It is a reminder of the ‘rashtra chetana [national consciousness]’ which excludes people.”

Akoijam had said that there has been a “civil war-like situation” in Manipur and the Union government has been “a mute spectator” to the tragedy for one year.

In April, ahead of the Lok Sabha elections the prime minister had claimed that the timely interventionof the Centre along with the efforts made by the state government led to a “marked improvement in the situation” in Manipur.

However, last month violence had erupted in Manipur’s Jiribam district after the body of a Meitei man was found in the Mulargaon area.