The ceasefire-driven ‘normalcy’ continues to have an extraordinary meaning in Nagaland. Despite two of the principal insurgent groups entering into separate cease-fire agreements with the Union Government in New Delhi, at least 108 deaths have been reported in 2007, positioning Nagaland in the third place in the vortex of violence in the States of India’s Northeast, behind Assam and Manipur. Fatalities in 2007 are marginally below the 147 deaths reported in 2006, but this represents little improvement in the circumstances in Nagaland, where the insurgents continue to exert a vice-like grip over every walk of life.
Year
2006
2007
As repeatedly emphasized in SATP, internecine clashes between the National Socialist Council of Nagaland–Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM) and its rival Khaplang faction (NSCN-K) – with the state’s security forces (SFs) reluctant to intercede to impose order – remains the most significant obstacle to establishing peace in the State. The year 2007 witnessed little change with militants comprising a staggering 81 per cent of the 108 militancy-related deaths in 2007. Further, of the 88 militants killed, almost 80 per cent died in the fratricidal conflict between the two factions of the NSCN. Such clashes also led to a ‘collateral’ 12 civilian casualties. Factional clashes thus accounted for 76 per cent (82 out of 108) of the annual fatalities. Providing figures on the impact of the continuing clashes between the two outfits on March 25, 2007, the State Home Minister Thenucho disclosed in the Legislative Assembly that 270 lives [101 NSCN-IM, 110 NSCN-K, 25 Naga National Council (NNC) and the remaining civilians] had been lost in a total of 378 factional clashes in Nagaland, and 159 persons had been injured, between March 2003 and March 19, 2007.
The Institute for Conflict Management’s data for the year 2007 indicates that at least 58 internecine clashes occurred in 10 of Nagaland’s 11 Districts. Each of these little battles of attrition has been rooted in a continuing struggle for area dominance. The fight for dominance in Mon District entered into a complex phase with the November 11 attack by NSCN-IM cadres on the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) militants transiting through the Tizit town, from their bases in Myanmar, to Assam. Two ULFA cadres and one NSCN-IM cadre were killed, three others injured and two ULFA cadres were taken into ‘custody’ by the Naga group. Mon being the northern-most District of Nagaland, positioned at the tri-junction between Myanmar, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh, had been a traditional stronghold of the NSCN-K, which has long provided safe passage to the ULFA cadres. Recent NSCN-IM incursions have led to a diminution of the NSCN-K dominance over the District and this ongoing struggle for control is believed to be principally responsible for the attack on the NSCN-K’s ally, ULFA. Similarly, on November 24, the Governor of Goa, S. C. Jamir – a former Chief Minister of Nagaland – survived an assassination attempt when his 30-vehicle convoy was attacked by NSCN-IM militants with improvised explosive device (IED) blasts near Changki in the Mokokchung District. Two security force personnel were injured in the attack, which was the fourth attempt on Jamir’s life. The attack represents an incursion by the NSCN-IM into the Khaplang stronghold. The NSCN-IM, however, denied its involvement and alleged that the attack was ‘stage-managed’.
The war of attrition is spread across almost the entire State, with little concern for compliance with the cease-fire ground rules, which stipulate that the militants stay in designated camps, ban their movement in uniform and with arms and prohibit extortion. Both the factions were allotted seven camps each, but NSCN-K cadres had reportedly been driven out by the rival group from their seven designated camps by mid-June 2007. While the Union Government directed and set the deadline of June 30, 2007, for the two factions to return to their designated camps, the NSCN-K truce supervisor and ‘senior minister’, Kughalu Mulatonu, said that they would not adhere to the directive of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA): "Under no circumstances will the NSCN enter the designated camps on the dictates of either the Assam Rifles or Nagaland State (Government)." Further, Lt. Gen. (Retd.) R.V. Kulkarni, the Chairman of both the Cease-fire Monitoring Group and Cease-fire Supervisory Board, had set September 25-morning as another deadline for both the factions to vacate the capital, Kohima, and its surrounding areas. The vacation order was issued following the reported concentration of armed cadres of two the groups in and around Kohima on a massive scale.
Militants, however, continue to move unhindered in the townships and country-side, enforcing their groups’ diktats across Nagaland. Intelligence reports indicate that the cadre strength of the NSCN-IM has increased from 800 to about 2,500 since the July 1997 cease-fire announcement. The outfit’s well-oiled ‘finance department’ engages in wide-spread ‘tax-collection’ activities and its ‘home department’ virtually runs the State administration. Its ‘crime suppression department’ ensures control of its areas of dominance, administering a selective ‘justice’ over various ‘offences’. The torching of human habitations continues to be part of the NSCN-IM’s area domination exercise. The Zeliangrong Hoho, the apex organisation of the Zeliangrong Naga tribe, did pass a resolution, during a meeting at Jalukie town on September 10, 2007, not to pay ‘taxes’ to the NSCN-IM militants in protest against the August 28 torching of at least 30 houses of the tribesmen by the outfit at Jalukie Zangdi village in the Peren District. The NSCN-IM justified its act by saying that the Zeliangrongs had encroached upon the land of the Kacharis, another Naga tribe. The Zeliangrong tribe, however, stated that there was no land belonging to Kacharis in the area.
The overriding dominance of the Naga militants has not been challenged either by any significant Police action, nor the Army or Central Para-military Forces, which are bound by the ceasefire rules to carry out any necessary counter-insurgency operations to suppress the activities of the militant groups and implement the ceasefire rules. The State Government has been reduced to a mere witness to the enveloping scenario. In a bizarre move, on December 1, 2007, Chief Minister Neiphu Rio asked the Union Minister of External Affairs Pranab Mukharjee to prevail upon Myanmar to declare a cease-fire with the NSCN-K instead of trying to drive the rebels out of Myanmar soil. The Chief Minister cited ‘political’ as well as ‘economic’ reasons for suggesting such a ‘bold’ measure, despite the reported findings that the NSCN-K has been sharing camps with many militant groups, including the ULFA and the Manipur-based United National Liberation Front (UNLF), in the Sagaing Division in Myanmar.
Three rounds of peace talks with the NSCN-IM were held in 2007. However, issues like the unification of the Naga inhabited areas in Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh remained a stumbling block and no progress has been achieved. In the July 31 dialogue round, however, New Delhi and the NSCN-IM decided to do away with the requirement of a periodic extension of the cease-fire, agreeing on an ‘indefinite’ extension. At the other end, talks with the NSCN-K, under the cease-fire agreement since May 28, 2001, have remained a non-starter. The Khaplang faction principally remains opposed to any negotiations between the Government of India and the NSCN-IM. The existing cease-fire agreement with the Khaplang group was, nevertheless, extended for another year on April 26, 2007.
Initiatives to engage the Naga community-based groups in the negotiation process, coming from certain non-State quarters, have also followed a similar trajectory, leading nowhere. An across the State cease-fire among all the Naga outfits was declared to secure ‘peace without any pre-conditions’ at a meeting, organised by the Gaon Buras’ (village chiefs) Federation of Nagaland and Dobashis (communicators between various tribes) Association of Nagaland. The Naga Hoho (the apex council of the Naga tribes), Nagaland Baptist Churches Council (NBCC) and others participated in the meeting at Dimapur on July 24, 2007. While five NSCN-IM representatives took part in the meeting, the rival NSCN-K and NNC did not attend the meeting. A day after the cease-fire move, a group of 40-60 cadres of the NSCN-K and Federal Government of Nagaland (FGN) attacked rival NSCN-IM militants at Phek town. Expressing the NSCN-K’s uncertainty about the credibility of resolutions adopted in Dimapur, its senior leader, A.Z. Jami, stated that they did not accept the proposals of the civil society groups as they produced a different draft before it and not the one adopted on July 24. Eventually, on November 7, the General Secretary of the NBCC, Rev. Zhabu Terhuja, held the two NSCN factions responsible for bringing "chaos and destruction" to Nagaland.
To tide over the factional clashes and establish unity among the militant groups is considered, in certain quarters, a key to bringing peace. For instance, an inter-factional ‘truce agreement’ was signed by ‘Kilonser’ (Cabinet Minister) C. Singson of the NSCN-K and ‘Kilo-Kilonser’ (Home Minister) Azheto Chophy of the NSCN-IM at Hovishe under the Niuland Sub-division in the Dimapur District on November 23, 2007. Armed cadres of both sides, including ‘kilonsers’ and ‘tatars’ (Members of Parliament), reportedly converged at the meeting chaired by Hokiye, President of the Western Sumi Hoho, who declared that the Hoho will cease to support any party which does not abide by the joint declaration. On the same night, well-placed sources from the IM faction informed Newmai News Network in Dimapur that the joint declaration was drafted without the knowledge of the group’s ‘higher authority’, thus bringing an end to the much touted ‘unification move’.
The peace process in Nagaland has been reduced to a façade for the fratricidal struggle for dominance between the two warring militant groups, with IM gaining an edge over the Khaplang faction. The Centre, the State Government and, consequently, the SFs, have demonstrated little inclination or will to step in to impose the ceasefire ‘ground rules’, and there is increasing evidence that they exercise little control over the trajectory of the conflict and the contours of a solution to the intractable insurgency in Nagaland.