Dimapur, April 13 (MExN): Maintaining to be a “vanquished people,” the JAC of tribe Hohos on delimitation rues the treatment of ‘big brothers’ meted out to their ‘small brothers: The government’s clarification only further exposes the discriminatory attitude of the government towards some of the Naga tribes, the Hohos assert.
Reacting to the clarification issued through the Chief Secretary, a lengthy response from the JAC stated that “the ulterior motive of the majority tribes/districts is undoubtedly expressed by claiming the impugned manipulated proposal as a ‘major victory’ which necessarily implies that the minority districts/tribes of Longleng, Kipheri, Wokha and Peren who have not only been denied justice but also looked upon as their enemy.”
The JAC asserted that census 2001 is neither the only census conducted in Nagaland that shows an abnormal decadal growth above the National growth rate, nor is the present delimitation exercises the first of its kind. “The delimitation of ’63 and ‘74 were implemented without a whimper from any quarter though some of the tribes/districts were given a raw deal and that too according to the ‘not so normal’ censuses of 1961 and 1971. It is common knowledge that even existing seats of some districts/tribes were forcibly snatched away against all norms and propriety in 1974. Now that the Delimitation Act 2002 has righted the wrong by giving justice to the deprived peoples, the bogey of abnormal growth in the census 2001 is raised” the JAC fumed.
The sad fact is that the “big brothers, by their series of inactions” with regard to the issue of delimitation, treated the “small brothers of Longleng, Wokha, Peren, Kipheri, Tsemenyu etc as enemies” by conspiringly using all kinds of dubious means to retain the assembly seats that are not legitimately due to them, it stated adding that prominent tribes in the government have deliberately conspired to deny rights to whom due.
“Under the circumstances, the vanquished tribes are pained to observe that the whole exercise of the ongoing delimitation, designed by vested groups and fully backed by the government machinery in defiance of all democratic norms to retain the unfair share of seats by hook or by crook is a matter of grave concern for every right thinking citizen” it stated.
The JAC also pointed out that seat-entitlement based on tribal population is the basis which the DLCI wants Nagaland to implement. Over and above, according to the Nagaland member of DLCI’s statement in the news paper recently, the ‘DLCI is not competent to exempt any state from the delimitation process’ therefore; the status quo proposal which is another word for exemption cannot find favour with the DLCI.
Also, going through the copy of the draft working paper sent by the Delimitation Commission of India dated March 14, it is apparent that the government of Nagaland has “worked overtime between 2004 and 2007 to misrepresent facts to the Delimitation Commission of India which made the DLCI to come up with the above working paper…”
Buttressing its stand, the JAC also mentioned that Nagaland assembly presently is only a sixty-member House. The total population, as per 2001 census (the basis of the present delimitation), is 19, 90,036 lakhs.
Therefore, approximately each A/C in Nagaland should have a population of 33,167, it explained. “Entitlement of seats for a district would be normally the total population divided by 33,167 persons (- +10%) for administrative convenience. The same arithmetic would be adopted in case the delimitation is on the criteria of tribal population only. In this case the average population for an A/c works out to 29,567 persons” the JAC elaborated adding that this criterion is being already adopted in the states of Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh.
If the same yardstick were to be used for all the districts, the JAC elaborated, the following picture would emerge:
