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Front Page >> Features > Story

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Agenda- Bedrock Of Naga Society
By S.C. Jamir
The 16-point Agreement of 1960 came about when the Nagas were going through the worst of times. But it was also one of the best things to have happened to the Naga people because it led to the birth of Statehood—on whose firm foundation our society is built. In a larger form of things, due to the Agreement, for the first time, the world recognized the territory of the Nagas as Nagaland.

But of late, there has been an increasing tendency to criticize the 16-point Agreement signed between the Naga People's Convention (NPC) and the Government of India that led to the creation of Nagaland State on December 1st 1963. The criticism implies that the 16-point agreement was a mistake, as the demand of the people was for complete independence from India. When carefully analyzed, much of this criticism is bereft of historical facts and emanates from a section of frustrated politicians solely for the sake of narrow political and personal gains.

Such groundless criticism can be safely ignored. However, what is of greater concern is that similar comments are also being made by impartial persons who have no political axe to grind and who genuinely have the interests of Nagas at heart. They too seem to believe that the 16-point agreement compromised the demand for a sovereign Naga nation. The voice of such persons deserves attention. It is, therefore, necessary that the truth should be stated and the record set straight.

The fundamental assumption underlying the notion that Statehood compromised the sovereignty of Nagas, is that the Nagas were a separate independent entity from time immemorial till the British rulers conquered them. Therefore, when the British left India in 1947, the Nagas should have reverted to their independent status. Prima facie, this sounds an attractive proposition, but is it really true? Let us not be misled by words like ‘time immemorial’. Did we have an independent political existence at all immediately before the British rule or even during the British days? Were we really an independent nation?

The stark and inescapable truth is that neither did we have a definite and unified political structure and nor did we exist as a nation. We were actually a group of heterogeneous, primitive and diverse tribes living in far-flung villages that had very little in common and negligible contact with each other. Education did not exist and awareness about the world outside was totally absent. Each village was practically an entity in itself. The main ‘contact’ between villages was through the savage practice of headhunting. Mutual suspicion and distrust was rife. Internecine warfare was the order of the day. There was no trust or interaction between different tribes. In these circumstances, the question of a unified ‘Naga nation’ did not arise.

We continue to claim we were an independent nation till the British conquered us. Did we have a boundary for our nation? As late as the 1940's, when British rule was almost over, large parts of today's Nagaland did not even exist on their maps. Instead of showing villages the maps showed large blank white spaces with the words “Unadministered and Unsurveyed”. Did we have a ruler or a Government? The British Deputy Commissioner sat in Kohima out of convenience. Was this the capital of the independent Naga nation that we claim existed before the British? Did we have a currency or a coinage like other kingdoms or nations? We lived on barter till the British introduced the rupee.

The answer to all these are obviously in the negative. The plain fact is that we never existed as an independent, unified nation at any time in our history. Yes, each village existed independently, but is that the equivalent of a Naga Nation? Even the names Naga or Angami or Ao or Sema or Chang were unknown to us. We called people of different tribes by other names. We led a primitive and brutish life in our villages, uncivilized and unlettered. The word of Christ was unknown and unheard of.

Life beyond the village boundaries was unknown. We had no idea of the concept of a nation or independence or nationhood. Is it right to make these tall claims that we were an independent nation before the British conquered us? Beginning from the early 1950s, the Naga “nationalism” gained momentum and was accelerated with the election of AZ Phizo as President of the NNC on December 11, 1950. Under Phizo's leadership, the Nagas conducted the Plebiscite of May 16, 1951 in which it is claimed 99.9 per cent of the Nagas voted for independence. This Plebiscite emotionally integrated the various Naga tribes, and boosted the morale of the movement.

Most scholars agree that the whole Naga problem was ineptly handled by the then police and administration. The banning of the NNC in 1952 was a blunder which compelled the leaders to turn underground once and for all. The movement was given its first martyr when an officer of the Assam Police shot dead Zasibito Angami of Jotsoma village on October 18, 1952 during a public demonstration. The ban was a blunder because Delhi did not realize the popular support the NNC had at that point of time.

An opportunity to settle the problem once and for all came when the prime ministers of India and Burma visited Kohima on March 30, 1953. But the then deputy commissioner of Kohima, for reasons best known to him, did not allow the Nagas to submit a memorandum to the visiting prime ministers. The several thousand Nagas gathered at the venue to receive the VIPs turned and left the ground en masse when they learned they were not to make themselves heard before the prime ministers. This was, indeed, a turning point in the history of the Nagas. It is agreed that political will was lacking somewhere down the line. But more important, awareness of each other's way of life and reasoning was deplorably inadequate and thus, the impasse.

The abduction, torture and killing of T. Sakhrie by his own people saw the splitting of the movement into two with the majority of the Nagas finding themselves literally. Nagas began to hunt, torture and kill fellow Nagas which, understandably, divided the sympathy of the Naga people. The movement too, was divided and it fell into disarray. It became obvious that we had overestimated our strength and that the Government of India under-estimated our capabilities to fight a long-drawn out battle. At the same time, it also became painfully obvious that the public have suffered enough—too much blood had been shed and too many precious lives have been lost.

The Government of India was clear that sovereignty was not possible under any circumstances. And also sensing the mood of despondency among the people, it made clear that status quo should continue and the Naga Hills would remain as a district of Assam. It seemed as if the Naga people had no future. It seemed as if the Nagas were destined to be lost in the multitude of people with alien culture, different thinking and aspirations.

It also appeared that the Naga movement initiated by Phizo had reached a dead end. And it was at this time that a few educated and patriotic persons who felt that the Naga people took stock of the then prevailing situation, and resolved that even if Independence was not possible, the land, identity and individuality of the Naga people should never be compromised with by remaining as a district of Assam.

After due deliberations, and ensuring that all the different tribes made their feelings known, the Naga People's Convention was formed and a series of meetings were held at Kohima in 1957, at Ungma in 1958 and at Mokokchung in 1959 to seek the opinion of the people before responding to the invitation of the Government of India. And after protracted negotiations with the Government of India, the 16-Point Agreement was signed in 1960 and the State of Nagaland born in 1963.

This Agreement is a remarkable document and it was the first of its kind signed by the Government of India with any section of its people. Nagaland is the only State born out of an agreement. This is indeed remarkable in the days when Delhi followed an iron-hand policy as far as integration of the country was concerned. Statehood of Nagaland was the amalgamation of the aspirations of the people especially their aspirations to live in peace, normalcy and prosperity. It was a covenant without a battle to end a senseless war, and credit must go to the Naga leaders who had the rational desire and human instinct to escape from the senseless conditions of war that prevailed at that point of time. And it gave the Nagas worth and significance in the yes of the world.

It established parliamentary democracy in our society and ensured that the destiny of the Nagas would be decided and charted by the Nagas themselves and not by someone alien to their ways of life. Article 371 A of the Constitution guarantees that, unless the Legislative Assembly of Nagaland so decides, no Act of the Indian Parliament would apply to the State of Nagaland in respect of

i) religious and social practices of the Nagas
ii) Naga customary laws and procedures
iii) administration of civil and criminal justice involving decisions according to Naga customary laws and
iv) ownership and transfer of land and its resources.

It has indeed, been a long and winding road for the Nagas in the last 37 years old Statehood. But nevertheless, we have come far and we have reasons to boast of our achievements. The State Legislative Assembly has voted a budget of Rs. 1,725 crores for the year 2000-2001. And this directly reflects on the amount of investment and the degree of development the people of Nagaland has made in the last three-plus decades. Houses even in the remotest areas have CGI roofings with roads leading to them. Schools, play grounds, electricity and health care facilities have been provided to one and all. Our literacy rate stands at 83 per cent, ranking among the highest in the whole country. Above all, we have our own elected legislators and about a lakh of government servants to run the government thereby enabling us to determine our own destiny.

What has happened to the movement for independence is clearly visible today. All idealism seems to have been lost and the goals for which thousands suffered and sacrificed their lives appear to have been completely forgotten. The movement has now degenerated into sheer terrorism with killing of innocents, extortion, looting, intimidation and threats becoming the order of the day.

What was once a movement of the people by the people for the people, is now reduced to meaningless terrorism with the so-called national workers embarking on a spree of extortion and self-agrandisement?

Statehood fulfilled the aspirations of the Nagas to a large extent. The identity of the Nagas had been preserved as desired by Naga leaders ever since the feeling of Naga-oneness began. We have a new millennium ahead of us. We have no choice but to look forward, evolving new ideas on how to survive and exist as a people in the next millennium. The future is the theme, not the past. We cannot now afford to live in the myths of the past. Are we going to prepare to face the challenges of the future in order to survive, or will we live only in the dreams of the past by which we will surely perish? We also have to be in consonance with the historical processes that are emerging and are likely to govern the world society.

*** The author is the Governor of Goa and a former Chief Minister of Nagaland.

*** The article was published at http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/

*** The article has been published with permission still awaited.

*** You may visit http://www.organiser.org/dynamic for further readings.

 

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