Thepfulhouvi Solo
The Government India was not too humored with India’s Good Friend in the United Nations -Rev. Michael Scot on the question of Sovereignty of the Naga; and his Indian Visa did live long. He left India soon after he brokered an Indo-Naga Ceasefire Agreement between Government of India and the Federal Government of Nagaland in 1966.
Today, an opportunity has come to the Naga people to discuss the Sovereignty question of the Naga openly and freely.We must take this opportunity of the present political dispensation and discuss the Issue freely, openly in Public as this is the core of the Naga political aspiration.
Different Naga Communities appear to have Sovereignty in differently degrees of appreciation or feel Sovereignty in different degrees of values. This different appreciation has to be integrated into a single consensus Idea acceptable to all the Naga.
Let us have a bird’s eye view of them:
When the 9-Point Agreement, between the Governor of the Province of Assam –Sir Akbar Hydari and Gopinath Bordoloi –the Premier of Assam, on the one hand and the Naga National Council on the other, was being discussed at Kohima in 1947, some Naga took the separation from Assam was taken as almost the separation from India and were willing to opt for Autonomy from Assam.
The other Group of Naga felt the Autonomy did not measure up to the Naga expectation of Sovereignty and hence were not willing to accept it however maximum power it may bestow on them.
The NNC ultimately informed the Governor on August 14, 1947:
“Naga Hills cannot be considered part of the Indian Union until heads of proposed agreement between the Governor of Assam and the Naga National Council is accepted to the letter for execution, with No.9 modified as ‘at the end of this period the Nagas will be free to decide their own future’”
Thus, the political Journey of the Naga for a thousand Li of its history has begun and still continues. Today an excellent opportunity has come for the Naga to express its opinion on the Sovereignty they have in mind for negotiation with India.
Personally, the Writer would prefer the negotiation be based on the Premise of the Angami concept of Sovereignty:
John Butler, a 19th Century British colonial Surveyor of Naga Hills said:
“Virtually every man does that which is right in his own eyes, and it is a law unto himself, ‘a form of democracy’ which is difficult to conceive as existing for a single day and yet that it does exist here is an undeniable fact”.
R. Steward, another Colonial Officer recorded:
“They acknowledge no king among themselves, and deride the idea of such a personage among others. When Questioned, they proudly plant their spears in the ground, and pointing at them, declare they have no other Raja”.
A Naga Student of Politics in a University in India asked a famous Political History Professor what Sovereignty actually is. The Professor replied; “Are you a Naga, if so, you better go and ask your Gaun Burah in your Village, he will tell you better”.
To the Naga, SOVEREIGNTY means “Unmitigated Freedom”.
The Naga ‘Sovereignty’ and Ravi’s “sharing of sovereign power” do not sound the same Rational Bite; one of them may have to be transvestite that the two are merged.
Ravi also said: ‘Shared Sovereignty’: “was to be a division of Power with Nagaland having absolute Power.”
Now “’having absolute Power’ and ‘a division of Power’” are different meaning of the same Oxford Language that would need very serious discussion for long sessions of discussion across the Table to narrow the differences in the Meanings.
Philosophically speaking; No Stone should be left unturned to arrive to a common consensual Point but the Writer fears no consensus may be found in the Parties concerned during this political dispensation. It may even deadlock as in the case of the Federal Government of Nagaland and the Government of India leading to the shortening of the Inner line Permit for the Bright Interlocutor.
The Writer proposes 2 suggestions:
1. India has acknowledged the ‘unique history of the Naga’: let it acknowledge in written: ‘the Naga has every right to Sovereignty’, then the Naga, on his own choice, opt to live for a period of 99 years with India as ‘Indian Naga’, on completion of 89 years of the Period, the Naga would initiate new negotiation Terms.
2. Leave the Sovereignty Question in the cold Storage for 99 years with other Items agreed of the Concord operating.
