Kaka D Iralu
The following article is made up of excerpts from a paper presented at the international conference on Armed Conflicts in Eastern India held at Shillong from December 1-2, 2006. The original 10-paged paper was entitled, “An anthropological and historical analysis of the Indo-Naga war”. In this just concluded Seminar, besides a pantheon of scholars from various universities of India and abroad, high government officials like Sunil Lal, joint secretary to the government of India, ministry of external affairs, MM Jacob, Governor of Meghalaya, Professor Mrinal Miri, Member, National Advisory Council etc. were present. The conference’s main concern was to intellectually analyse the socio-cultural and economic reasons that have supposedly created insurgency problems in the Northeast and the Eastern parts of India. Many of the scholars came with the mindset that economic reasons like poverty and underdevelopment are the causes of insurgency in the Northeast. These Scholars at the conference, tried to rectify what they called “flawed development strategies” in order to find “democratic compromises and negotiations” to solve the insurgency problems of the North East.
My paper was presented to counter all these misconceived notions in regards to the conflict between India and Nagaland. Listening to scholars after scholars and Indian bureaucrats who were totally misinformed about the real issues of the confict, I felt that even after 59 years of conflict, Indian scholars and bureaucrats still do not know why there is a conflict in Nagaland.
POINTS AND EXCERPTS FROM THE PAPER
1. The Indo- Naga conflict is not an economic conflict caused by Naga poverty or underdevelopment. Nagas in their history have never depended on foreign aid for their economic survival. Nagaland is a country of abundance where the “profession of begging” has never existed in her culture or society.
2. The Indo-Naga war is a conflict between two sovereign independent nations. This conflict started when fifty three thousand Indian troops moved into Nagaland in October 1955. In the ensuing war, 645 Naga villages were burned to ashes through Ariel bombardments, heavy artillery bombardment and attacks by jet fighters, light armoured tanks and also deployment of massive ground troops. Within two years (1956-57), over one hundred thousand Nagas (mostly civilian) were done to death through bullets, bombardments, starvation, rape, torture and disease. Some of the scholars were adverse to my usage of the word “Indo-Naga War”. They argued that the Indo Naga conflict is just an internal Indian law and order problem. My reply to them was to point out the fact that Nagaland declared her independence on 14th August 1947 and was invaded by India in October 1955. I asked them “Are bombers, Jet fighters, armoured tanks and heavy artillery deployed in internal law and order problems?
3. Continuation of the excerpts. No nation on Earth has fallen to the Earth from the skies or crept out from under the ground. All national histories of any nation on earth have evolved from a concrete geographical land. Like any other nations on earth, Nagas also call their geographical land as Nagaland. Nagaland is not in India but India is presently in Nagaland through invasion and forced occupation. Nineteen Naga traitors in 1960 invited the Indian government to set up a puppet Indian Naga State in Nagaland. Forced elections were held in Nagaland in 1964 and a puppet Indian state was established in Nagaland from that time onwards. (For details see, Nagaland and India, The blood and the tears, pp 15-22)
4. Naga history and Indian history are two entirely different histories. Nagas were never Indians in the past. They are not Indians in the present neither will they ever become Indians even in the future. Social corporations like banks or business establishments can merge with one another and become bigger establishments. However, different nations can never synthetically merge into bigger nations. In other words, African can never become an Englishman whether you try to buy him with money or bash him to pieces with unjust laws and violence. The same racial principles also applies to Nagas and Indians.
5. Coming to the issue of the separateness of the Naga history and Indian history, in historical records, Nagas along with the Kachins and the Karens etc migrated from Mongolia in B.C. 1225. After crossing Turkistan, Tibet and China, they entered the Naga Hills in the early BC 1120’s. In the AD era, Cladius Plotemy mentioned about their existence in their present lands in AD 150. Their continuity as a people (nation) inhabiting their present lands is also extensively mentioned in historical records like the Manipur royal chronicles “ Chiethoral Kambabu and Ningthoral Kambabu (AD 663-AD 996). Their historical presence in their lands were also mentioned by Heuin Tsang in his records “ Si-Yu-Ki” ( AD 643) They are also extensively mentioned in the Ahom records – The Burungis.(AD 1228 to the end of the 19th century) The Nagas fought their neighbouring Ahom kingdom for over six hundred intermittent years defending their geographical territories. They also fought against their neighbouring nations like the Burmese, Tripuris, Manipuris, Kacharis etc. In the modern era they fought the British imperial power from 1832-1947. From 1947 to date, they have been fighting with India in defence of their history, their geography and their rights.
6. Naga and Indian histories, though coexisting as neighbours for all these centuries have existed independent of one another. Nagas are, by race Mongolians with their own distinct Mongolian history. Indians are mostly Dravido-Aryans with their own distinct Caucasian, Negroid and proto Mongolian history. Racially, they are not from the same anthropological root. Religiously, their beliefs are worlds apart. Socially, their cultures are poles apart. Therefore, to say that Nagas are Indians and Nagaland is Indian Territory is to defy and challenge the scientific discipline of anthropology, history, politics and international law. These scientific disciplines and facts are the foundations of human history. Upon these facts are based, the reality of the fact of different nations inhabiting different parts of the present world. In this reality, Asia too is inhabited by different nations of which Nagaland and India are also two of them. Wars erupt between nations when one nation tries to forcible incorporate another nation into themselves.
QUESTIONS AND STATEMENTS RAISED IN THE PAPER
1. The White and European nations of the west came, conquered and ruled Asia, Africa etc from the 15th century to the middle of the 20th century. Their conquest and subsequent rule were all acts of aggression that must be condemned by history and all the people who were subjugated by them. It is also however, a fact of history that Mongolians established the first Eurosian (Europe and parts of Asia) empire in the 4th and 5th centuries. This world empire was established by Mongolians by the likes of Attila, the Hun and Gengis Khans. These acts of aggression and occupation of European lands by our Mongolian ancestors should also be condemned by one and all. The Huns however did not dissect or mutilate European lands when they left Europe. In the light of these historical facts, the questions that Nagas must ask the European nations and in particular, the British nation is this:
“The lands that you ruled for some time in Asia were never historically your ancestral lands. Why then did you mutilate Asian lands on your departure? In our Naga context, though our leaders had submitted upto six memorandums to the British clearly stating why Nagas are not Indians and would not therefore join the Indian union, why did you dissect Naga country into two, giving half to Burma and the other half to India and left? Your artificial boundary lines have even dissected our Naga houses into two. Yes, who gave you the moral, political or legal authority to dissect other people’s lands and give them as presents to nations of your own choice? Sooner or later, these issues will be debated and resolved from international tribunals and forums. In the Naga case, the British not only presented our lands as gifts to India and Burma but they also armed India and Burma heavily before they left. With these arms, these two governments have killed over two hundred thousand Nagas in the span of the over half a century Indo-Naga-Myanmar war. Sooner or later, Nagas shall one day bring the British into international courts of law where the British will be made to answer these questions. These questions are questions of international implications”. They are issues bigger than Indian and Myanmar put together.
2. With reference to India and Myanmar, this is the question we would like them to answer before us, Asia and the world at large. “Who gave Jawaharlal Nehru and U Nu the moral political or legal authority to decide who shall be a nation and who shall not be a nation in the lands inhabited by smaller Mongolian nations between their respective territories?
Nehru for one was not ignorant of these facts as he, in connection with the Coupland plan had clearly stated thus: “The tribal areas are defined as being those long frontiers of India which are neither part of India nor Burma, nor of Indian Sates nor of any foreign power.” The question is “How can these territories with their own independent histories (independent of Burma and India) simply disappear into India and Burma after 1947 and 1948?” Is there any case in human history where a bigger nation can swallow a smaller nation and get away with it?
Yes, the Indo-Naga- Myanmar issue is not an internal Indian or Burmese issue. The issue is in fact a long-standing invasion issue, which will sooner or later be debated and resolved from the highest international level. In this modern world of globalisation and the internet, don’t let any Indian or Burmese scholars, bureaucrats or politicians even think that they can get away with their half a century crimes on the Nagas and Nagaland.
These then are the anthropological and historical facts why Nagas are neither Indians nor Burmese. These are also the reasons why Nagas are fighting for their own history and their own place in the community of nations on earth. Here, neither India nor Burma can intimidate us into submission or surrender. Also, any so called sub settlement below Naga sovereignty and independence will be an act of treason to Naga history geography and right.
