Manipur activist Irom Sharmila has been offered refuge by the state’s Red Cross wing, after it emerged that she had no place to stay following her decision to break her 16-year fast against the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. Sharmila has faced resistance around the state for ending her hunger strike, and was reportedly barred from entering the locality of a friend with whom she was meant to stay after leaving the hospital where she was confined.

Y Mohen Singh, the honorary secretary of the Red Cross, Manipur, said, “Considering the complexity of the situation, where she has no place of shelter, we have decided to welcome her on the Red Cross office premises on humanitarian grounds,” according to The Hindu. The organisation has sent her a proposal making the offer, though she has not accepted it yet.

Sharmila has not yet moved out of the Jawaharlal Nehru Institute of Medical Sciences in Imphal, where she was forced-fed for 16 years through a tube while courts tried her for attempting suicide. Doctors at the hospital said she is still acclimatising to eating again.