June is the month
Mizoram celebrates the anniversary of its peace accord, signed in 1986
and considered the most successful of such pacts in the country.
With a new
dispensation at the Centre headed by Narendra Modi, speculation is rife
that this Mizoram peace model will be applied to Nagaland; after all,
the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah) has been in
peace talks with the Centre since 1997.
The reason for the
glimmer of hope to end the Naga imbroglio emanated from the fact that
Neiphiu Rio, who contested and won the Lok Sabha elections in the second
year of his third term as chief minister of the state, will now be in
Delhi. He is, therefore, suitably placed to catalyse truce overtures.
In 1986, a tripartite
agreement was signed among the Centre, represented by the Union home
secretary, R.D. Pradhan, the Mizo National Front’s firebrand leader,
Laldenga, and the Mizoram chief secretary, Lalkhama. Statehood was a
prerequisite for this accord, so Mizoram became a state on February 20,
1987.
As a fall-out of this
accord, the state’s chief minister, Lal Thanhawla, stepped down to
offer his seat to the militant leader, Laldenga, with the proviso that
elections would be held in six months’ time. Should the Mizoram model be
applied to Nagaland, the leader of the militant NSCN(I-M), Isak Chishi
Swu, will be expected to become chief minister under similar terms, with
the current chief minister, T.R. Zeliang, magnanimously sacrificing his
seat.
Major differences
The comparisons cease to be rosy
when one considers the ground reality. For one, while Mizoram was happy
to earn statehood, dropping its earlier sovereignty demand, Nagaland is
already a state. It also enjoys a special status under Article 371A of
the Constitution. The NSCN’s insistence on ‘Nagalim’ or greater
Nagaland, comprising contiguous Naga-inhabited areas of neighbouring
Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Manipur will possibly not be acceded to. So
what do Swu and the NSCN(I-M) general secretary, Thuingaleng Muivah,
get for their decades’ long struggle?
Besides, unlike the
MNF, which was a cohesive unit under a single leader, there are
dissident NSCN factions, one headed by S.S. Khaplang and the other by
the Khole-Kitovi duo. They are unlikely to shower rose petals during
Swu’s coronation.
The Mizoram
settlement had included the handing over of all arms to the Union
government and the rehabilitation of underground personnel, the
conferment of statehood on the union territory of Mizoram, and the
establishment of a separate university and a high court, among others.
Rehabilitation of
surrendered militants is usually the biggest hurdle. In the case of
Mizoram, Laldenga’s 580 cadre were disarmed and restricted to peace
camps (called Remna Run). They were given Rs 2,000 for their immediate
needs. This was followed by another grant of Rs 20,000 for buying
household goods. Each member was also given half a bigha of land
to build a house with a grant of Rs 40,000. But while some were given
jobs in the state police or started a business, many of their erstwhile
comrades-in-arms squandered the money on liquor and remained
disgruntled. Thus, even after two decades, all is not well with the
implementation of the Mizoram Accord.
This has been the
story of subsequent surrenders elsewhere too: the top few hog the
limelight and acquire big bucks; the rest are left to grovel, shedding
dreams and hopes for utter disillusionment.
For Nagaland, with its myriad tribes and factional fratricide, scripting a different denouement
calls for political acumen, sacrifice and the shedding of stereotypes.
It would be foolhardy to expect it to adapt to any existing model of
peace.