At first glance, Ima Keithel is much like any other market. Lines of vendors are here from dusk until dawn, eagerly flogging everything from fresh fruit to fish and fabrics. But after walking through its huge network of more than 5,000 stalls spread across three multi-story buildings and a sea of surrounding tin shacks, one unique aspect becomes hard to ignore: every single trader, without exception, is a woman.
” Thanks to Imphal’s easily-accessible, strategic position at the center of Manipur, the city gradually grew to become the economic hub of the region, and the women of Ima Keithel became more and more influential. But beyond the day-to-day business trading and exchange, the hardy matriarchs of Ima Keithel have also played a crucial role in social and political activism in Manipur throughout the 500-year-old history of the market right up to this day.