Staff Reporters
DIMAPUR, AUGUST 9
The Naga People’s Movement for Human Rights (NPMHR) has vouched for the rights of the indigenous people, living in Nagaland and Assam, to manage their traditional lands and ecosystem in parallel to the “respect and co-operation” from the “non-indigenous immigrant peoples residing in our lands” to manage the same.
This was contained in a message from the NPMHR, delivered on the occasion of International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples at Yanpha village in Wokha district on Sunday. The event was held with the objective of identifying the fundamental need for strengthening the indigenous peoples’ roles and responsibilities as custodians of their land and ecosystem.
The participants of the event on Sunday include indigenous Karbis and the Tai-Ahoms from next-door Assam, Rengma Nagas of Assam, representatives from Naga Students’ Federation (NSF), Indigenous Women Forum of North East India, the Lotha Hoho and the people living in a border village of Yanpha and its adjoining areas under Wokha district.
The NPMHR designed this idea to celebrate the age-old neighborly ties, share cultural values and practice systems, and dialogue with one another for a more unified approaches for undertaking the realization of this year’s United Nation’s theme, “Indigenous Peoples’ as Custodians of the Land and its Ecosystem.”
For centuries, the Nagas, Ahoms and Karbis have been maintaining strong political, social and economic ties with each other through acknowledgment of land boundaries. Trading through barter system was a central element in strengthening ties as indigenous communities where the agricultural produce like cotton, linseed, ginger, fruits, etc., from the Naga areas would be traded with Salt from the Ahoms of Assam.
“However, in recent years, disputes and misunderstandings have emerged often intensifying into serious conflicts for ownership of land, a colonial legacy, which, in the interest of neo colonial Delhi government, still continues”, an NPMHR statement read .
Citing the inter-state border conflict at Ralan area, under Wokha district, the NPMHR pointed out that in recent years conflict over land disputes has emerged not directly between the indigenous neighbors but because of immigrants backed by state government and its policies over the past decades, where the indigenous Naga community has been pushed to the wall for their land occupied by immigrants from other states of India along the Nagaland- Assam states border.
“The non-indigenous immigrant people residing in our lands owe respect and co-operation to us in managing our land and ecosystem. In as much as they are assets to the land, it is also only just that these fellow social groups do not cause conflicts among the indigenous communities whose land they occupy.”
It affirmed that the indigenous people will partner with those social groups in the search for more responsible custody of our land and continuance of ecosystem.
The celebration was marked by speeches from representatives of the indigenous communities from Assam and Nagaland and the NPMHR. Cultural exchange, in the form of dances and songs, was also hled in the later part of the celebration.
