MANTRAYA ANALYSIS# 82: 17 DECEMBER 2024
BIBHU PRASAD ROUTRAY
Abstract
Notwithstanding the renewed threat by the NSCN-IM to initiate an armed campaign, the Naga insurgency’s objective for a special status for Nagaland is not achievable. The Naga insurgencies are weak, divided, and incapable of sustaining a new phase of armed rebellion. In addition, the Naga population has little appetite for another period of unrest and instability. However, it could change with external help. In the evolving scenario, New Delhi needs to craft a clearer strategy to achieve sustainable peace in Nagaland.
[NSCN-IM’s General Secretary Thuingaleng Muivah speaking at a function in Dimapur (Nagaland) in March 2024. Photo Courtesy: Ukhrul Times.]
The ‘Threats’
On 8 November (2024), the National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM) issued an ultimatum. The group stated that if its demands for a separate flag and constitution were not accepted by the central government, it would resume its insurgency. The NSCN-IM is the oldest among the many insurgent groups in the state and has a significant number of members. Under normal circumstances, such a threat would cause alarm in New Delhi. This time, however, the government did not react, suggesting that it did not attach much importance to the threat. The group’s desperate demands, made during peace negotiations with the government which have gone on since 1997, are unlikely to be granted.
While the NSCN-IM’s threat was considered newsworthy and was given wide coverage by media, a similar demand issued a week before by another umbrella organization of seven insurgent groups in Nagaland was all but ignored. On 31 October, the Naga National Political Groups (NNPGs), which is in consultation with the central government, asked the latter to implement measures such as a separate page in Indian passports for the Nagas and a bicameral legislature in Nagaland. The NNPG said these demands should be fulfilled by the end of 2024. The government hasn’t responded to this statement, either.
‘Shared Sovereignty’ Demands
Aptly called the mother of all Indian insurgencies, the Naga insurgency originally sought a unified and independent homeland of Naga-inhabited areas of India and Myanmar. Over the years, however, there has been a drastic climbdown by the NSCN-IM and the newer groups under the NNPG. Both now seek shared sovereignty — a special status for the state under the Indian constitution. However, even those demands may be difficult for New Delhi to grant.
Much has to do with the diminishing fighting ability of the NSCN-IM. Headed by its general secretary, 90-year-old Thuingaleng Muivah, the group boasts a cadre strength of about 5,000, but it has not been fighting the Indian state for the last 27 years, ever since a cessation of hostility agreement with New Delhi came into force in 1997. In the initial years after the agreement, most of the NSCN-IM’s armed conflict was with its bete noire, the Khaplang faction (NSCN-K). The group also carried out widespread ‘tax collection’ drives with its armed cadres moving out in the open and collecting money to fund its existence. None of those actions, though, can be equated with the capacity of the group to begin an armed campaign against the Indian state.
Cracks Within
There are reasons to believe that internal divisions, some of which might have been orchestrated by New Delhi, have weakened the group’s cohesion. For instance, in March 2024, fourteen top ‘officers’ of the group’s military wing revolted against their commander-in-chief, “Lt. Gen.” Anthony Ningkhan Shimray. They accused Shimray of being an agent of New Delhi, which was trying to break the revolutionary groups in the northeast. Shimray had been arrested in September 2010 at Kathmandu airport while on his way to India from Bangkok, his detention allegedly for negotiating an arms deal with a Chinese company. Shimray spent the next six years in Tihar jail in Delhi but was surprisingly released on bail on 4 August 2016 by a special court of the National Investigative Agency after the public prosecutor pleaded that his release was in the interest of the peace negotiation between the Nagas and Indian government.
After his release, Shimray was made the longvibu (commander-in-chief of the Naga Army) but went on to reveal that he had been tasked by the government to bring the insurgencies of the region overground. The ‘officers’ who revolted wondered if Shimray served the interests of the NSCN-IM or the government of India. They cited several instances in which Shimray has weakened the military strength of the organization. In response, Shimray’s loyalists termed this a mutiny and sought to ‘nip it in the bud’. Shimray continues to remain the longvibu and coordinator of the ‘Indo-Naga peace talks’.
New Delhi’s Stratagem
The 8 November ultimatum is a desperate attempt by Mr. Muivah to keep his flock together. The NSCN-IM holds on to the Framework Agreement it signed with New Delhi as a holy grail that recognizing the unique history of the Nagas and expects the central government to honour it by granting it a separate flag and constitution. New Delhi’s interpretation of the Framework Agreement, however, is markedly different. The style and content of the negotiation by the government’s interlocutor in the post-2015 period suggest that New Delhi has no intention of providing any special status to Nagaland. It is noteworthy that for several years, there wasn’t even an interlocutor for the talks between the two sides, only a representative of the Central Government, a former chief of the Intelligence Bureau. An elusive solution to the Naga conflict is taking a toll on the group, which has called for a third-party intervention to break the deadlock.
New Delhi has pursued a similar strategy with the more pliable NNPGs. Somewhat similar to the Framework Agreement, the NNPGs signed the “Agreed Position” agreement with New Delhi in October 2017. The group interprets the agreement as New Delhi’s recognition of the Naga identity ‘with a separate page in the Indian passport, a separate contingent of Nagas in all international events and an enhanced representation in both Houses of Parliament.’ NNPGs term NSCN-IM’s demand for unification of all Naga inhabited areas in northeast India as impractical. Yet, its own demand, in the assessment of New Delhi, is also illogical. Similar to the NSCN-IM, the non-implementation of the “Agreed Position” agreement has started creating divisions within the seven-member NNPGs. Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio, who favours a political solution to the Naga conflict, has hinted at the divisions within the NNPG.
Where Could It Go Wrong?
Both the NSCN-IM and the NNPGs initiated a process of collaboration in September 2022 by signing a joint accord and forming the ‘Council of Naga Relationships and Cooperation.’ The move purportedly was to deal with the delays in solving the Naga issue and to resist divisions among the Nagas, but the move towards unity hasn’t progressed further given the distinct objectives pursued by both. In December 2023, the NSCN-IM denounced the NNPG as ‘treacherous, traitorous, disloyal and perfidious.’
As desperation rises among the insurgent groups, New Delhi hopes that its strategy of keeping the Naga insurgent groups divided and prolonging the negotiations may eventually force both groups to completely give up and possibly lead to their dismemberment. New Delhi’s best bet is the Naga population, who have no appetite for another period of unrest and instability, much less full-blown insurgency. But the beginning of an insurgency isn’t about the entire population trying to wage war, it’s about a few thousand cadres making up their minds about the usefulness of an armed campaign. While events have unfolded as per the script so far, any move towards unity between the NSCN-IM and the NNPGs could pose a fresh challenge to New Delhi. Further, plummeting Indo-Bangladesh bilateral relations and the civil war situation in Myanmar could play crucial roles in shaping the response of the Naga insurgent groups. With the ongoing conflict transformation phase, the road to peace in Nagaland remains long and uncertain. New Delhi will need to take cognizance of the local and regional dynamics and develop a long-term strategy to achieve sustainable peace.
(Dr. Bibhu Prasad Routray is the Director of MISS. This analysis has been published as part of Mantraya’s ongoing “Fragility, Conflict, and Peace Building” and “Mapping Terror & Insurgent Networks” projects. All Mantraya publications are peer-reviewed.)
