K.K. Sema
MIZORAM is as much a Christian State as that of Nagaland. Their vibrant Church Organizations too had vehemently opposed the repeal of the Prohibition Law from their State but it appears that their political leaderships have been able to maturely discern a more pragmatic reality of the adverse impacts of Prohibition in their society. Three very loud cheers for Mizoram for their sanity in realising their reality! It is about time for Nagaland too to admit the system failure and do away with this induced hypocrisy which has practically crippled and ruined the fundamental fabrics of true Christian values in every other subsidiary walks of life. No one in his/her right senses will deny that excessive consumption of alcohol is injurious to one’s health and mental well being...but despite it all, God did give mankind the individual freedom of choice, to do the right thing or the wrong, which is being questioned and overruled by the Church. Convincing theological or secular arguments can strongly be mounted ‘for’ or ‘against’ Prohibition. However, a dispassionate look at our reality must dictate the basis of our final verdict....
So let me share an honest truth...and reveal the inner untold story that everyone knows but have never been spoken out, upfront: As a senior bureaucrat before retirement, I have had the privilege of attending most of the State level official parties hosted for one reason or the other by the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Nagaland. In every party so hosted, the best of the prohibited substances like whiskey (Johnny Walker Black, Blue, Green, Red, Gold Labels) / Brandy(Napoleon Bardinet etc. etc.)/rum/ beer/vodka, wine... you name it... all flows like a perennial river and we as bureaucrats have all been the happy revellers doing our best to drain this river dry to the detriment of our livers and mental health, to no avail. It was a never exhausting stream, and so, many would beat a homeward bound retreat, walking sideways like crabs to their vehicles at the end of such a ‘fine’ official party. When this is the scenario of reality at the highest echelon of a Government, can anyone in their right senses believe that prohibition in our State will actually work? Can the Church Leaders officially dare the Chief Minister to put a stop to this farce to begin with and lead by example...even if it means losing their organizational financial droppings from their political masters or individual favours like being appointed as Member/ Chairman of NPSC or some such secular positions? ‘Responsible’ Church leaders, active members of Mothers’ Association and other NGOs who have their children in high places, emulate their very Hon’ble Chief Minister in their private parties, right in front of their eyes, have nothing to say to their children... and yet vociferously lead a mob against prohibition out in the open streets to register their ‘make believe’ uprightness before their community. Any acceptable Dictionary would describe such characters as hypocrites...and no one is really free of this disease. Let me put it as bluntly as blunt must mean: when the enforcers of Prohibition are themselves the users, no law on earth can be enforced! It is about time that the Nagas wake up and face this reality squarely. Prosecuting a poor Excise constable at the entry check gates for letting a few bottles of liquor get past him and closing our eyes to the monumental default at the highest echelons of our society, is a glaring case of public hypocrisy at its best. Think this over in the quiet hour.
We have often heard arguments from the anti-prohibitionists how much annual revenue is being compromised because of prohibition by a poor State. No doubt...there is a fundamental truth in this. However, revenue loss is the least of our problem. The real potential danger of prohibition lies elsewhere. Let us take a clearheaded, intelligent stroll down history lane and learn lessons from a much more progressive country like the United States of America, which began with Prohibition as a nationwide Constitutional ban on the sale, production, importation, and transportation of alcoholic beverages from 1920 to 1933.
The subject of prohibition and its enforcement was a ferociously debated issue even in the US during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, just as we in Nagaland are confounding ourselves. Though it was popularly believed that Prohibition failed, in reality it did succeed in cutting overall alcohol consumption in half during the 1920s, and consumption remained below pre-Prohibition levels until the 1940s, suggesting that Prohibition did transform a significant proportion of the population towards less alcoholic consumption habits. The question is, if prohibition was a success why did USA finally ratify their Eighteenth Amendment “Volstead Act” that enforced prohibition, and introduce their Twenty-first Amendment on 5th December 1933 to repeal it? It is here that Nagas must exercise their minds pragmatically.
The 1920s Prohibition era, ushered in unintended consequences ...the growth of criminal organizations, including the modern American Mafia. Italian-American gangs (along with other ethnic gangs) entered the booming bootleg liquor business and transformed themselves into sophisticated criminal enterprises, skilled at smuggling, money laundering and bribing police and other public officials. Prohibition accelerated the crime rate significantly as black market turf wars were waged openly between the competing mafia gangs, just like our Factions fighting and killing one another to protect their tax collecting turfs. It is all happening in Nagaland right now, except that in Nagaland they do so under the guise of fighting for independence. It would be of interest to know that the Mafia, a network of organized-crime groups based in Italy and America, evolved over centuries in Sicily, an island ruled until the mid-19th century by a long line of foreign invaders. Sicilians banded together in groups to protect themselves and carry out their own brand of justice. In Sicily, the term “mafioso,” or Mafia member, initially had no criminal connotations and was used to refer to a person who was suspicious of central authority. By the 19th century, some of these groups emerged as private armies, or “mafie,” who extorted protection money from business houses and eventually became the violent criminal organization known today as the Sicilian Mafia, spreading fear, mayhem and chaos. The Sicilian Mafias had flourished since the mid-19th century, but was under attack from the Fascist regime of Benito Mussolini (1883-1945). Many Sicilian Mafiosi escaped to the United States where they got involved in bootlegging and became a part of the burgeoning American Mafia. The American Mafia, which also rose to power during the period of Prohibition in the 1920s, is a separate entity from the Mafia in Italy, although they share such traditions as ‘omerta’, an all-important code of conduct, secrecy and silence that forbid any cooperation with government authorities. Together, the Mafia spread their tentacles into every spheres of life, corrupting the Government machinery to the core. While trying to control the abuse of alcohol, the USA was now unwittingly faced with a greater threat of a corruptive system spawned by prohibition that had gone completely out of control. The Federal Government of USA then began their all out war against the Mafias through various legislation, which did precious little to mitigate the problem. In the end, they identified the root cause which lay in Prohibition. Thus came about Twenty-first Amendment on 5th December 1933 repealing Prohibition. Cutting the long story short, that is the history of Prohibition in the USA. They learned a lesson the hard way. Do the Nagas too need to learn this lesson by going through the same process they did instead of learning it from their experience, forgetting the saying that “the wise learn from other’s mistakes; the fools by their own”? Take a careful look at our present circumstances.
Because of Prohibition, bootlegging is a thriving business in Nagaland, just as it did in the USA. The NPGs are not only behaving like the Mafias with a very flimsy cover of fighting for ‘sovereignty’ as a camouflage while mercilessly extorting money from the public but are also using the Illegal Bangladeshi Immigrants (IBI) as their tool for all kinds of questionable activities in Nagaland, which the NGOs are helplessly voicing their concerns against. A day will come when these IBIs will independently mature on their own into the kind of Mafia that America is still battling with. It has already taken the shape of organized syndicates with criminal inclinations. While it has perhaps not necessarily mushroomed to a significant magnitude of the Mafia system of the USA, we are certainly not very far behind. Consider some of the daily occurrences in our daily lives. When criminals/rapists are brought into custody, they are released promptly by the courts, no matter how much it is resented by the people. Why? Our Courts are already under threat from the ‘mighty powers in the shadows’ and cannot dispense justice as is their obligation to do. These are strains that have already crept into the system and the public is ill equipped to stop this rot from setting in. It will grow stronger as the time goes by. Most importantly, while NSCN(IM) is going through the process of negotiated settlement with the GoI, their stubborn stance of going it alone forebodes a potential threat to our future. They must realise that all other Factions are equally armed, well financed through extortion... called ‘tax’, recruiting new members and growing all the time. Undermining their existence will be a costly mistake. The GoI has made it amply clear that “sovereignty” and “integration” is not negotiable. Therefore, even if the final solution is brought by the NSCN(IM), minus sovereignty, they will have to contend with the residue of all other factions who will definitely not acknowledge any settlement without sovereignty, even if it is for the sake of an argument, unless they unitedly pursue the matter on a well pre-considered common agenda for a solution. The left out cadres have the potential of reshaping their existence into Mafia squads armed to the teeth and continue their ‘struggle’... raising /extorting ‘tax’ in the name of “Sovereignty” with enhanced vengeance. The final solution with the GoI will then be followed by another even worse ‘civil war’ within ourselves. There will be no end to this game. Therefore the clarion call by FNR and ACAUT for all the NPGs to unite, must be understood in the right perspective and the masses must jointly make an effort to make this happen. Without a concerted effort by the masses, Nagas will be fated to a double jeopardy inflicted by Prohibition and the NPGs in its present form. It will spell the doom of the Nagas in the long run. Think about it.
The writer is a retired IAS Officer.
Forest Colony, Kohima
