Son of a legendary Manipuri musician, slain guitarist Chongtham Vikram was a child prodigy, revered mentor

Renowned Manipur-born guitarist and music teacher Chongtham Vikram, who was beaten to death outside his apartment in Southeast Delhi’s Kilokri village on September 7 allegedly by a group of eight people aged between 18 and 36 and a minor, leaves behind a musical legacy he had inherited from his legendary mother Chongtham Ongbi Kamala Devi, a classical and modern Manipuri singer who was also a playback singer in early Manipuri movies.

Vikram, 54, himself had developed his musical skills at a young age and went on to work with several bands back home in Manipur and also in Delhi before he collaborated with Rajasthani folk singer Mame Khan in the Rock 'n' Roots project, and later set up a music school in his Delhi home and devoted his life to mentoring young musicians.

Atom Kennedy, a Manipur musician who grew up watching Vikram, said he always looked up to the ace guitarist for his amazing musical skills and for pioneering western music in the state. Kennedy had lived for 19 years in Delhi as a musician before shifting back home to take care of his ageing mother in 2019. Kennedy, who used to play for the band “Traffic Jam”, in Delhi, remembers watching Vikram both in Delhi and in Manipur as he worked with multiple bands before retiring to teach music. “I still cannot process in my mind the news of his death. He was such a soft-spoken person who was loving towards everyone. He was such a great musician, too. We have lost him too early,” Kennedy, a singer and a guitarist, told Open in a phone call from Imphal, emphasising that Vikram was comfortable with various platforms of creativity, including making ads besides performing on stage. “Vikram was always a calm person deeply into music,” he said. Kennedy currently performs for High Volt, an Imphal-based band.

Former vocalist Nanao Haobam, who was Vikram’s classmate in Don Bosco School at Chingmeirong, Imphal, says he and Vikram grew up together. “We fought, we jammed, we celebrated, and when we were finishing our class X, we started the band called Ultra Vires,” says Haobam who went on to pursue his studies in his 11th and 12th standards to a college in Dehradun while Vikram went to an educational institution in Shillong. “But we had enough time to jam together and stay together for three years and perform across various locations during that period. It was a terrific experience and we enjoyed being together to the hilt,” he says, adding that then they all parted ways. Haobam went to study engineering in Karnataka and Vikram to places like Kolkata and elsewhere.

Haobam says he kept in touch with Vikram and more so with his parents back home: “His father who was in the veterinary service is now 90-plus and his very talented mother is 83,” he says, recalling that the last time he met Vikram was more than 10 years ago during a visit to Delhi. Haobam looks back with great pride and warmth at the musical career of Vikram who went on to work with bands such as Phoenix and Eastern Dark besides Fubar Ghetto, formed in 2010 in Delhi. The band would play live music at various locations in the national capital, including in embassies.

According to his friends, Vikram was a childhood prodigy who learnt to play the accordion and guitar by the time he was eight and, like his mother, performed for All-India Radio. He later came under the spell of musicians in Kolkata and began improvising his style and blending various genres.

According to reports quoting Delhi Police, Vikram died after a group of “delivery workers and dhaba staff” allegedly assaulted him when he objected to them drinking alcohol and creating ruckus outside the apartment early on September 7. Speaking to Open, the departed musician’s brother Vivek said that he learnt of the incident close to midnight when Vikram’s son Yaiphaba, who is currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree and had rushed the guitarist to Holy Family Hospital, informed Vivek’s son about the incident. Vikram succumbed to injuries at the hospital. Vivek says that Vikram collapsed at the door of their apartment from where his son, wife and a neighbour carried him to a vehicle before he was rushed to the hospital. Vikram’s assault and murder is the latest in a series of assaults on people of northeast origin residing in Delhi.

Those arrested in connection with the assault on Vikram that led to his death are Bharat Kumar (19), Pramod (26), Ramzan Khan (22), Deepanshu (21), Mohan Vishwakarma (32), Vijay (36), Mannu (26) and a juvenile, PTI reported quoting police. Vikram, it is learnt, was attacked by these people after he gently asked them to speak softly.