We were once sons and daughters of a vibrant culture that was built on the firm foundations of honesty, integrity and hard work. We were then sovereign and independent villages, dependent on nobody for our political or economic survival. We were so, because then, we lived under the shadows of our own proud rainbow flag of freedom and liberty. But somewhere along the way, some of our own people brought a saffron colored flag to fly over our lands. And life has never been the same since then.
From then on, a plastic culture emerged in our lands, where we became dependent on others for our political and economic survival. And for the past 58 years since statehood, we have all been busy building this plastic state and culture. And whether we like it or not, we are all entrapped under its laws and regulations. Of course, this plastic state and culture also has its glitter and glare. Under its alluring shadows, some of our own few privileged ones have made their millions. But what this glittering saffron flag totally lacks is freedom and liberty. In fact, such a saffron flag is totally foreign and alien to our own customs and culture.
And yet, for how many more times are we going to talk about our so called privileges under Article 371(A) of that saffron flag and Constitution? Incredulous educated Nagas seems to be totally incapable of ever understanding that the Disturbed Area Act of 1954 and AFSPA 1958 (etc), have already cut article 371(A ) to pieces? These naïve Nagas seems to be foolishly turning around a ripened apple in their fingers without realizing that the apple is laced with poison under the skin. This poison laced apple, hanging on the plastic tree, has almost destroyed our culture. It has now started to corrode even our Christianity and our ethics. But somehow, we are still carrying on building this plastic state and culture, hiding now even under an external form of Christianity.
In the 1950’s, under the banner of the Naga National Council and the Federal Government of Nagaland, we were able to give an excellent account of ourselves in defending our independence. In my opinion, our heroic records then had surpassed the records of any other nations in history. But tragically, beginning in the early 1980’s, we disintegrated into all sorts of factions and started hoisting our own small “plastic rainbow flags” in the name of this revolution and that revolution. In the end, today, we are both an externally as well as internally suppressed people. We are indeed today a tormented people, denied our national freedom by a “saffron plastic flag” on the one hand and extorted by many “plastic rainbow flags” on the other hand. Just tell me how a nation can politically and economically progress under such throttling and suffocating circumstances?
But now, as a new year dawns on all of us, let us resolve ourselves to throw away all these saffron colored plastic flags and rainbow colored plastic flags from our land and our country. Let us for once and all, stop building all these plastic states and plastic cultures. May the new ear bring us new insights and new commitments to build a true nation under our own God given Rainbow flag. Long live- all true sons and daughters of Nagaland.
