A talk on "the security
scenario of NE" was delivered by
Mr. B. K. B. Rao, a former secretary, security of India at Choksi Hall, I. I. Sc. This talk was arranged by the I. I.
Sc.'s Prashthutha Forum ([email protected]).
Mr. Joykumar, a
research fellow with IISc, attended the talk and has prepared this report for the
global Manipuri community.
The turn out of the students and the
faculty members for this talk was impressive. Some media persons and human right activists
were also present. The acute knowledge about this particular region of India from the
majority of the audience was clearly reflected apart from few Bengalies. In this talk the
speaker briefly discussed the root causes of all these problems and their ramification in
the context of maintaining India's union. He said that the root causes of these problems
are due to the loosing of the aspirations of the local people towards India, lack of
infrastructure developments, frustration from the educated as well as the misguided youths
and the alienation from the mainstream. Briefly he put forward the background and the
operating zones/regions of the various insurgent groups in NE. He also pointed out the
menacing situation of the rampant corruption prevailing in this region and the nexus
between the various groups and the politicians. The continuing collection of the money
from the Govt. employees and the businessmen and its channelisation by the insurgents were
also fully focussed. He also hinted about the difficulties in tackling the insurgency
problems particularly in this region due to the porosity and proximity of these states
with the neighboring countries. The involvement of the external hands like ISI with the
sole aim of destabilizing India was also put forward. The most worrying thing that he
mentioned was the ugly face of narco-arm-terrorism.
He conveyed that the problems in Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Mizoram are not of much
of concern at the moment. But the problems particularly in Nagaland and Manipur are of
extremely disturbing and have the implication of wider aspect with the involvement of
foreign hands in the name of religion and so on. He also said that Manipur problem has the
potential of becoming the most dangerous one as the things are going out of control and
also due to the implication from the recent proposition and opposition for the bifurcation
of this state on the community lines. He too shortly mentioned about the ongoing peace
talk between Central Govt. and NSCN(I-M). He expressed the imminent doubt and possibility
of solving the Naga problem by endorsing their demand of forming a greater Nagaland by
integrating all the Naga inhabited areas in NE. Sadly he pointed out that people of this
region became much stressed and are under the fear from both the security forces as well
as the insurgents. He painted some of the negative images of some of the leaders of
various organizations leading a lavish and luxurious lifestyle in some of the costly
cities like Bangkok, Dhaka and Thimphu with cocktails, cables and cell phones etc. leaving
alone the lower cadres who are not trained properly to the field as the scapegoats as just
to demonstrate to the public as well as to the security personals that they are still
active and kicking. He also pointed out some of the mistakes made by the insurgent group
like ULFA mentioning those infamous incidences like that of the kidnapping and the
subsequent killing of one of the famous and young social activist Sanjay Ghosh and the
extending of support to Pakistan during the recent Kargil war which all led to the loosing
of the support for their cause from the local people of Assam. Unfortunately he missed to
point out the socio-geopolitical background and the status of NE states before joining the
Indian Union. And also the imposition of the Arms Special Power Acts 1958 and National
Security Acts(1964?) and the outcomes of these acts like the suppression of people and the
human right violations were kept in the dark.
About the ways and means of solving of these cancerous problems, he himself was not very
confident about and instead he invited the suggestions from the audience. One fellow from
the audience suggested about the crushing of all these movements by sending forces. But
the speaker had the fear of flashing of the subjection and the human right violations etc.
to the international media by some of the NGOs that are really doing great job for the
people of these states. One intelligent guy suggested about the solving of these problems
by creating jobs and bringing the developments through enthusing and thrusting the IT
opportunities to the people of this region. Finally the speaker and the audience came to
the conclusion that there are no easy solutions for this worsening and dangerous problems.
But at last he could suggest an important suggestion that these problems can only be
solved by the local people having strong will power with the strong economic support from
the Center.
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