The Search For an End to the Complex Naga Conflict

Context:  The absence of the Nagaland Governor and the Centre’s interlocutor for Naga peace talks, in the recently-held meeting of the Naga peace process in New Delhi and the subsequent involvement of the Intelligence Bureau to carry the talks further only testifies the intractable nature of the conflict. 

Support for Naga insurgency

• Safe haven: In the early phase, the Naga insurgents were provided with what has come to be known as ‘safe haven’ in Myanmar.
• External support:  India’s adversaries (China and Pakistan) provided them with external support

Tactics used by India  to tackle insurgency (cease fire tactics)

• Statehood to Nagaland in 1963: Not successful to contain insurgency

• Shillong Accord of 1975: Signed with Naga National Council (NNC)  whose offspring  was the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN)

• Peace negotiations  with all:  NSCN split into several factions, the Centre responded with entering into peace negotiations with almost each of them.

• Framework agreement in August 2015: Initially with National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah) NSCN-IM, the most powerful of the Naga insurgent groups and later other factions were also included.

Reasons for undesirable outcomes of these cease fires 

• Creation and existence of unspoken ‘spheres of influence’

• Culture of extortion

• Collapse of general law and order situation in Nagaland: organised armed gangs run their own parallel ‘tax collection’ regimes. 

• Mobilisation of the Naga population in neighbouring States

Concerns about NSCN-IM

• Tax collection: One of the major aims of the NSCN-IM has been to acquire formal recognition to this informal practice through negotiations.

• Affiliation with underground groups: They were unnerved over a recent directive by the Nagaland government asking its employees to self-declare the membership of any of their close relatives with underground groups.

• Unease over interpretations: controversy about the interpretation of ‘sovereignty’, as reflected in the latest “Naga Independence Day” speech by NSCN-IM chief

• Demand for a separate flag and a ‘constitution’

• Managing weapons in the NSCN-IM camps: Many influential cadres are seen moving with weapons in civilian localities, leading to many problems It would be an uphill task for the Centre to ensure that all weapons are surrendered at the time of the final accord.

• Allegations about interlocutor: to have manipulated the framework agreement.

Conclusion: Centre must keep in mind that most of the armed insurgencies across the world do not end in either total victory or comprehensive defeat, but in a grey zone called ‘compromise’.