15 December 1995
By Kuldip Nayar
Two flags fly at Kohima, capital of Nagaland state in Northeast India. The one atop government offices is the national tricolor, which proclaims that the territory is part of India. The other, all white, flutters at the building called Peace Headquarters, to remind New Delhi that it signed a cease-fire agreement with the Nagas on Sept. 6, 1964, at Chedema (near Kohima), where the white flag was raised first.
The confusion, more than contradiction, that the two flags convey describes the unsettled conditions which obtain in Nagaland. People say they have not accepted integration with India. But the impression in the country is that the problem has been sorted out, except for the insurgency of some 7,000 underground militants.
Indeed, the state of Nagaland, India's 16th, came into being on Dec. 1, 1963. The constitution was amended to give it a special status. Both developments were the sequel to a number of efforts the Nagas and the government made to straighten the issue.
In August 1957, there was a Naga People Convention (NPC) but it broke up on inclusion of the words, "within the Indian Union" in the first resolution. The convention, at its third meeting, proposed a separate state for Nagaland in India under the External Affairs ministry. But many wanted consultations with "those who were fighting in the jungles." That has not taken place up to now. Still, Jawaharlal Nehru announced in Parliament on July 28, 1960, that India had accepted the Nagas' "desire" for a separate state.
What was accepted was a temporary arrangement "to create" conditions for talks. People await the dialogue for a "final settlement." Most Nagas believe the NPC was a mediatory body. Talks have yet to materialize and the rider is that they should be "without any precondition." Chief Minister S.C. Jamir of the ruling Congress argues: "No precondition should be set by any side and the dialogue should be unconditional." His political opponent, Hokishma Sema, of the N.D. Tewari Congress, alleges that "the promise to strive for a settlement of the Naga political issue has been reneged ..." (Two factions of the Congress are the only political parties in Nagaland). Others are also making the point that only a settlement will normalize the situation.
Yet, the Nagaland population of 1.2 million goes about its business as people in other parts of India do. The same law administers them and the same Indian Administrative Service or Indian Police Service takes care of the nitty-gritty of the government. Ten percent of Nagas are government employees. The basic necessities and luxuries come from the plains since they live in villages perched on mountains. Central assistance is generous, nearly Rs. 300 billion (about $9.1 billion) in the last 32 years. The state has gone to the polls seven times since its inception, returning their representatives to the state legislative Assembly more than 60 percent of votes, a bigger turnout than in the rest of India. (Each candidate spends more than Rs. 5 million).
But these are at best symbols of integration. They lose their validity when people consider them "a necessary evil" until they get what they want. Independence is a passion, nay, an obsession, with the Nagas.
They have a childlike belief that they will secure it one day. Sometimes it looks as if they are chasing a rainbow, which runs across the flag that "the Federal government of Nagas" adopted when it declared independence on Aug. 14, 1947, after the British left.
"We have never been part of India," they say. This is true in the sense that the British never brought the area under their close, regular administration. Khonoma, the village of A.Z. Phizo, who is revered as father of the Naga nation, has the remains of a British contingent which was defeated in 1879. A stone slab was fixed some years ago to commemorate the defeat of the regiment and the Nagas' victory.
Last week another slab was installed at the village entrance to list the names of the 46 Nagas who died at the hands of India's security forces. The inscription says: "They gave their lives for vision of a free Naga nation."
Recalling those days, village elder Pturoko Khate says: "India became free when the British left. So did we. Why should you subjugate us?"
As far back as 1929, when the Simon Commission came to India to assess the quantum of power London should transfer under the supervision of the Viceroy, the Nagas gave it a memorandum, which said that they were "quite different from those of the plains" and had "no social affinities with the Hindus or Muslims." Significantly, they said, "we are looked upon by one for our beef and the other for our pork." (They eat both). The Naga territory was left as the "Naga Hills Excluded Areas" in the British India Act of 1935.
One month before the British left India, a delegation of Nagas met Mahatma Gandhi, who said: "The Nagas have every right to be independent. We did not want to live under the domination of British India but I want you to feel India is yours."
He assured them, "if you do not wish to join the Union of India, nobody will force you to do that."
The observation is repeated by nearly all Nagas to point out that they have yet to make up their mind on the relationship with India.
Still it appears that they may not be averse to a formulation that safeguards their identity or, for that matter, their nationality. Many fancy a Federal structure with defense, foreign affairs and one or two more subjects staying with New Delhi. But no apparatus will work if they do not have the feeling of ruling themselves. The Nagas are suspicious of New Delhi. They have reasons to be so because there is hardly any Naga family which has escaped the repression.
Starting in April this year the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act has been introduced in Nagaland to give the security forces untrammeled powers. In fact, the Nagas' first introduction to free India has been through the security forces, with all their excesses and brutalities.
Only on March 5 this year did a convoy of theirs run amuck and fire indiscriminately, even with mortars, upon the people of Kohima to counter the underground's "firing," which turned out to be a tire burst. Seven people were killed and 16 injured. But for the timely intervention of conscientious Director General of Police Chaman Lal, things would have gone out of hand. There has been so much fear since then that the other day hundreds of people at a football ground in Kohima ran helter-skelter when they heard a balloon burst in their midst.
In reality, people live in fear -- the fear of the security forces and the fear of the underground. Kohima is a dead city by 5 p.m., the shutters of shops are down and the doors of houses shut. None dares to be on the street after dusk. One reason given for the heavy use of drugs and drinks is that the evenings are too long.
The Administration does little to oust fear because it helps it keep the people quiet. Many underground Nagas live with ministers, who use them to beat up critics or kill rivals. More underground Nagas die in intertribal warfare than at the hands of the security forces. Ministers' vehicles have been used for carrying black money. One such vehicle, when checked by the police, produced a letter from a minister to say that the Rs. 500,000 belonged to him.
Nearly 80 percent of the money that comes from the center for development goes to the pockets of ministers, officials and their hangers-on. Every head of department gives the underground their "share" before he distributes salaries among the employees. There is hardly a shop or office in Kohima that resists extortion. There has been no progress worth the name. Roads hardly exists; no government school has come up; no professional college nor any hospital. The Nagaland University, in the process of taking shape, reeks with corruption.
Still the Nagas, 95 percent Christians, remain very religious. Every village has a church and every church a priest. But the preachings have made no dent on corruption or infighting. When I asked a women teacher about the future, she uttered the word, "despair." That probably sums up the feelings of Nagas. They feel despair because they do not know if they would ever get rid of the security forces or the underground. Their despair increases when they realize that the cult of the gun has taken over their land.
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