Dimapur, April 13 (MExN): The United Naga Council of Manipur (UNC) has reiterated that it is not against the political aspirations of the Meitei (Manipuri) or other communities. However, the UNC said in a press release today, the “Nagas” have “always desired” to be able to live together “as a people and to have other communities as good neighbours.”
The UNC was responding to what it said are the “supposed options” of Meitei organisations and “purported intellectuals” of “Imphal valley” in the Media concerning the Indo-Naga political dialogue. “As the UNC has always maintained, it is not against the political aspiration of the Meiteis and other communities, which of necessity are rooted in the histories of the respective communities,” the organization’s publicity wing said. “While it is matter of inherent historical rights for the Nagas to live together as a people, for the dominant community it is their economic and political interest that Nagas should not have political empowerment to be able to decide their own future.”
The land of the Nagas and the tribal were not gifted by the Meitei Maharaja, the UNC said. “Meiteis lived in the Sanaleibak of the valley and the Hao tribals/Nagas lived in the hills. Our histories were different. The hills were never a part of the Meitei kingdom or its magnificent history. Nagas and tribal live in their own land. And Nagas and tribals alone must decide their destinies, which cannot not be conditioned and subjected to the interest and convenience of the dominant community of the valley,” the UNC said.
On the Indo-Naga dialogue, the UNC said it is between the NSCN and the Government of India as two entities. “Manipur is a state under the Constitution of India. But the parochialism and chauvinism of the dominant community as reflected in the recent statements emanating from the valley has given rise to the demand for alternative arrangements outside the communal government of Manipur by different tribal communities even as far back as 1948.”
The UNC also said “selective reference of the Kuki-Naga conflict in the 1990s” has been frequently cited to project the NSCN as the perpetrators of genocide. “It was a clash factored by many causes and chief among them was the instigation and manipulation of the dominant community in the state who were the silent and sadistic spectators. But nothing is mentioned of the massacre of Nagas by Kuki irregulars in 1971-1919 with the use of 600 musket rifles provided by the Meitei Maharaja. The targeting of Nagas does not reflect kindly on the historical and ethical sense of the Meitei intellectuals,” the UNC asserted.
The organization stated further that threat of use of violence “by referring to the June 18, 2001 mayhem is constantly used against changing the territorial boundary of Manipur.” Such threats, the UNC stated, does not change the fact that Nagas and tribals are not Meiteis and that there is already an irreparable social divide in the present state of Manipur.
“AMUCO and UCM rightly uses Manipur, which is without the Nagas and tribals in the hills. Their concern for Manipur’s (Imphal valley) territorial integrity is rightly placed. The “naked” Nagas have always desired is to be able to live together as a people and to have other communities as good neighbours. Sooner this position is understood as inevitable, the better it would be for all concern.”
