The Search for Naga-India Political Peace and Justice|Naga Peoples Movement for Human Rights|NPMHR

 

                      Image credit: Parvej Akhtar

September 4^th, 2021, New Delhi

Background

Nagas were Independent peoples and democratically self-governed like the ancient Greek city-states living in small village republics. Nagas are indigenous peoples numbering about 4.5 million living in their native land between Longitude 92.5E and 97.5E and 23.5degree N latitude and 28.5 degrees N latitude along the sub-Himalayan region of the Patkai Range. Thriving on a self-reliant economy, little is known about their contact with the outside world till the first quarter of the 13th century.

The Naga-Ahom relation

The Naga people came in contact with the “outside world” only as late as 1228 AD when the Tai invaded Assam. The superior force of Sukaphaa, a Shan prince of Mong Mao occupied the valley along the Brahmaputra river and established the Ahom dynasty (1228–1826). The Tai people also came to be called Ahoms. A peaceful relation was also established between the Ahoms and the Nagas that still exist today.

The Naga-British relation

By 1839 the Shan Ahom kingdom was weakened and disorganized by the continuous fighting and killings that took place between 1812-19 when the Burmese kings of Mandalay tried to conquer and subdue the Shan Ahom kingdom. This provided an opportunity for the British company which was expanding its empire to easily and completely annex the Ahom kingdom.

This expansionist policy of British East India Company led them to intrude into the Naga territory and from various directions, they began their foray into the hitherto unconquered Naga homeland. For a number of years, the British Government was content to leave the Nagas and their country alone except for an “occasional expeditions to punish a particular tribe”. The British also were unsure whether these “terra incognito” hill areas could “have enough economic worth or surplus revenue-yielding potentiality”.  

Adopting the policy of controlling the Nagas, from 1832 till 1851, as many as ten military “expeditions” to the Naga homeland were made resulting in skirmishes where both sides suffered losses. The Nagas, in this case, the Angami Nagas, bravely defended their homeland. Between the period 1851 to 1865, a “defensive policy based on non-interference” was followed.

Having failed in this policy, a more forward policy for subjugation was made and by 1866, Samaguting, the present Chumukedima, was occupied. Even so, resistance continued without any respite however less in effect might have been against the might of the British force.

The Lotha Naga region was conquered and annexed in 1875 where an administrative centre was established which was later shifted to Kohima in 1879. In this manner, by 1912, the territories of the Ao Nagas, the Sema Nagas and the Konyak Nagas were annexed and by the Government of British-India Act 1919, the Naga Hills District was declared as “Backward Tract” and was treated as “an entity”, separate from the British Empire.

Constant resistance continued against the British occupation. In 1929, a Memorandum was submitted to the Simon Commission wherein the Naga leaders stated that becoming part of the British India would gravely endanger the Naga people and their future. This led to the declaration of the Naga areas including the hill areas of present Manipur state as an "Excluded Area" by the Government of British-India Act, 1935.

Upholding their right to live as an independent nation and prior to India’s attainment of independence from the British Government, the Naga Delegation met Mahatma Gandhi at Delhi to place the Nagas’ assertion to live as an independent nation and not to be part of the Indian nation. Significantly, the Nagas declared their independence on the 14th of August 1947, a declaration which is still defended to this day.

The Naga-India political Impasse

The Nagas refrained from joining the Indian Union. In assertion to remain independent, a Plebiscite was organized and conducted in 1951. The outcome was 99.9% in favour of Naga independence. In March 1953 when Nehru, the then Prime Minister of India and U Nu, the then Premier of Burma converged at Kohima, the Naga Leaders sought to meet Nehru. The arrogant and insensitive Nehru refused to meet them thus signaling the start of India’s reign of terror in the Naga Nation.

By 1954, the Naga areas were militarized and the Indian armed forces unleashed their gruesome crimes of physical occupation, suppression and oppression, concentration and torture and killing, rape, sodomy, and massacre, desecration of holy places and such other acts that combined to totally dehumanize the Naga people thus shredding human dignity to utter bits.

Armed with the Assam Maintenance of Public Order Act, 1947(as amended in 1953), the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, 1958, and later the "Unlawful Activities Prevention Act 1967 (as amended in 1972)", the Indian the military unleashed terror on a scale unprecedented in the region where any Naga on mere suspicion was arrested and tortured or shot.

Continuing its full-scale war upon the Nagas, and having totally militarized the Naga areas, the Government of India forced some leaders of the Federal Government of Nagaland (FGN) to sign the so-called Shillong Accord, 1975, in the name of Underground organization. This was forthrightly rejected by the Nagas.

In the following years till the late nineties, the Nagas witnessed the worst of armed conflicts and rampant violations of human rights in the process of military persecution. This was a period when animals were safer than the Nagas in the hands of the Indian armed forces. The magnitude of human rights violations against the Nagas reached the corridors of the United Nations.

In 1995 the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (ECOSOC E/CN,4/Sub.2/1995/NGO/35 – 10 August 1995) through the Secretary-General circulated ‘the human rights situation in Nagaland’ in consonance with ECOSOC resolution 1296 (XLIV) (3 August 1995) wherein it stated:

“It profoundly regretted that four-decade-long genocidal campaigns of the Indian and Burmese armed forces against the Naga people have been called into question by the Commission on Human Rights. We urge that the danger inherent in the suppression of the people’s right be looked into before it is too late, if peace and justice are to prevail,”

Despite all odds, the resolute Nagas continued to defend their rights. All the powers vested to the Indian military could not subdue the spirit of the Nagas. It is also, an open secret that several Army Generals of India, like General Shankar Roy Chowdhury, former Chief of Army Staff, Lt. General John Ranjan (Johnny) Mukherjee, former Chief of Eastern Command, Kolkata, and Commander of 15 Corps of Jammu & Kashmir, Lt. Gen. Krishna Mohan Seth, former Adjutant General and Commander of III Corps of Nagaland and others had impressed upon the Government of India to seek a political solution as it could not be militarily resolved.

Political Dialogue

The mid-nineties witnessed the beginning of Dialogue between the Government of India and the Nagas at the initiative of the Government of India. Prominent Prime Ministers of India, beginning with Mr. P. V. Narashimha Rao, met the Naga Leaders on 15th of June 1995 at Paris, followed by Mr. H. D. Deve Gowda, in February 1996 at Zurich, including other leaders had engaged in peace talks with the NSCN (IM) leaders in various third world countries like Paris in France, New York in the USA, Bangkok in Thailand, Zurich, and Geneva in Switzerland etc.

As a result of these meetings, the Ceasefire Agreement was signed and declared between the Government of India and the Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland (IM), on the 25th of July 1997, for a three-month period with effect from 1st August 1997. This Agreement was announced by the then Prime Minister of India, I K Gujral, in the Indian Parliament on 25th July 1997. Chairman Isaac Chishi Swu of the NSCN (IM) made the announcement on behalf of the NSCN (IM) on the 25th of July 1997.

The Political Talks between the two entities started, based on the following mutually agreed three principles:

i.      That the talks would be unconditional;

ii.    That it would be held at the highest level (i.e., at the Prime Ministerial level); and,

iii.   That the talks will be held in a third neutral country.

These principles provided a glimmer of hope for search for a solution for both the Nagas and India.

On July 9-11, 2002, representatives of the Government of India and the National Socialist Council of Nagaland met in Amsterdam. This meeting recognised the “unique history and situation of the Nagas”. “The Government of India renewed the invitation of the Prime Minister to the Chairman and General Secretary of the NSCN to come to India at the earliest to carry forward and expedite the peace dialogue”. The NSCN leadership expressed willingness to come to India after the procedural aspects were addressed.

Responding to the official invitation of the Government of India, the NSCN (IM) leaders came to India in 2002, and from 2010, they have stayed on with a commitment to search and arrive at an acceptable and honourable political settlement.

Framework Agreement

The outcome of numerous rounds of Talks culminated in the signing of the Framework Agreement on the 3rd of August 2015. Mr. Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India in whose residence the Agreement was signed, lauded the agreement as “historic occasion”. The concluding remark of FA said: “It is a matter of great satisfaction that dialogue between the Government of India and the NSCN has successfully concluded and we are confident it will provide for an enduring new relationship of peaceful co-existence of the two entities. The two sides agreed that within this Framework Agreement details and execution plan will be worked out and implemented shortly”

The present impasse

The peace process has been nurtured by various Prime Ministers between 1995 and 2019. However, starting from 2019, the GOI began to deviate from the principles enshrined in the Cease Fire Agreement, 1997, the Joint Communique, 2002 and the Framework Agreement 2015. Re-adopting its fascist policy which was pursued in the 1960s and 1970s, the GOI began to dictate its terms with the least regard or consideration for the understanding and milestones scripted between the GOI and the Nagas through the ongoing peace process and political dialogue.

The appointment of the “Interlocutor” for GOI in the political dialogue as the “Governor” of Nagaland State is seen as yet another nail in its resolve to bury the political peace process. Presently, the office of the “Governor” of Nagaland state orchestrates the enactment of the fascistic policy once again like in the days of old.

The contents of the Framework Agreement were not brought to the public domain. The argument of Mr. RN Ravi, the Interlocutor for the Government of India and also the Governor of Nagaland state is that it could not be released “for security reasons”. The question arises as to how an agreement to bring peace amongst conflicting groups could be kept secret unless it is for a motive to serve an agenda to derail the agreed terms.

What is politically misleading and immediately criminal, traitorous and hence condemnable, is the act of Mr. RN Ravi who “craftily” changed the key political terms in the Agreement and began to circulate it amongst select individuals and groups thus dividing and misleading the Naga public and also the world. Mr. Ravi also wrongly briefed the Indian Parliamentary Committee on the same political matter. He further overstepped when he ordered for profiling the Nagas.

Such an act does not augment positive progress towards political peace. More so, as we now are convinced that the text of the agreement that was to be the basis for ushering in political peace and political justice has been doctored by the very Interlocutor of the GOI, a damning exhibit of dishonour and insincerity on the part of the GOI. The agreed intentions as culminated in the Agreement must be honoured and the political solution must be concluded on its basis.

Beyond the impasse

Learning lessons from the past failures, it is imperative that the long political dialogue starting from 1997 must logically culminate in political peace and justice. We call upon the Government of India to rise above mere territorial occupation and military subjugation but to honourably translate its recognition of the Nagas as a separate entity from India politically. We call upon both the parties to honour in letter and spirit what has been mutually agreed upon as the only way forward to establish honourable peaceful co-existence.

It is just and only logical that political dialogue must conclude in political peace and justice. Finally, we avail this moment to implore all fellow friends of the Indian sub-continent and workers of peace and justice the world over to enable the Government of India to honour its commitment to political peace and justice to the Nagas.