The Naga village republic represented one of the purest forms of democracy, where governance was exercised through established customary institutions and collective consensus.
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The Nagas, since the ancient times, lived as a free and sovereign people, governing ourselves according to our customs, traditions, laws, and institutions without external interference or control. Honour, integrity, honesty, and communal responsibility formed the foundation of our Naga society. The Naga village republic represented one of the purest forms of democracy, where governance was exercised through established customary institutions and collective consensus.
The advent of British colonial imperialism in the nineteenth century, however, profoundly altered this historical trajectory. Beginning with their first incursion in 1832 and continuing through a series of protracted military confrontations until 1879, the Nagas resisted foreign domination with extraordinary courage and determination. For nearly half a century, the Nagas fought tooth and nail to defend our ancestral homeland and sacred sovereignty. Despite the resilience and sacrifices, the Nagas were ultimately overwhelmed by the superior military technology and resources of the British Empire. Consequently, a portion of Naga territory fell under British administration.
As British rule in India approached its end, the Nagas became increasingly apprehensive about its political future. In 1929, through the Naga Club, it submitted a historic memorandum to the Simon Commission, unequivocally stating to the British to "leave us alone" to determine our own future as we had lived before colonial intervention. Thus, this declaration was neither a plea nor a petition. It was the voice of the Nagas reminding the world that our sovereignty predated the arrival of the British empire. Recognising the distinct identity and circumstances of the Nagas, the British subsequently placed the Naga Hills under the Excluded Areas provision of the Government of India Act, 1935. In doing so, it implicitly recognised that the Nagas occupied a political and historical position fundamentally different from that of British India.
With the imminent departure of the British, the Nagas formally declared its independence on 14 August 1947, a day before India's independence and a year before Myanmar erstwhile Burma. This declaration was communicated to both India and the United Nations Organisation (UNO). The Naga people reaffirmed this political aspiration through a voluntary plebiscite conducted on 16 May 1951 under the Presidentship of Zapu Phizo, NNC, in which 99.9 per cent of the Nagas expressed support for an independent Naga nation. Furthermore, in a remarkable demonstration of political conviction, the Nagas unanimously and completely rejected India's 1952 General Election, a collective refusal to participate in a political framework of new India State.
A defining moment occurred in 1953, when Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru of India and Premier U Nu of Burma visited Kohima. Upon learning that Naga representatives would neither be permitted to speak or submit a memorandum to Nehru by the Deputy Commissioner, Satyen Barkatoki, the assembled Naga populace staged a peaceful walkout, leaving the venue largely deserted except for a handful of government officials. The incident reportedly caused considerable embarrassment to Jawaharlal Nehru. This image was deeply symbolic. A people deprived of a voice chose silence as their protest, and that silence echoed more loudly than any speech could have done.
Thereafter, relations between the Nagas and the Government of India deteriorated significantly. Many Nagas came to perceive New Delhi's subsequent policies as being influenced more by political pride and wounded prestige than by a genuine commitment to democratic dialogue. Consequently, less than two months later, the Assam Maintenance of Public Order, widely regarded by Nagas as the first draconian legislation, was passed and became a law on 26 May 1953. This stood in stark contrast to earlier engagements, when, on 1 August 1946, Naga National Council leaders had been invited by Nehru to join Indian Union and to discuss their future relationship with the emerging Indian Union.
Compounding the issue was the arbitrary demarcation of the international boundary between India and Burma (Myanmar), drawn without the knowledge, participation, or consent of the indigenous inhabitants whose ancestral lands were divided by it. Perhaps nowhere is this more vividly illustrated than in Longwa village, where the imaginary boundary line runs directly through the residence of the village chief, leaving his kitchen in Myanmar and his bedroom in India. Such realities remain powerful reminders of how colonial-era decisions fragmented a people whose historical, cultural, and social bonds transcended artificial frontiers. Thus, revealing the absurdity of colonial cartography. The mapmaker’s pen became a knife, slicing through a living nation without regard for its people.
For decades, India and Myanmar have sought to justify their respective claims over Naga territories through the language of colonial era inheritance, national security, border management, regional stability, and strategic interests. However, these arguments are viewed by the Nagas as fundamentally contradictory to India's own anti-colonial legacy. How can India and Myanmar legitimize political control over the Nagas whose political aspirations predate the emergence of the post-colonial states and now, claim authority over us?
Negotiations in the past have frequently been hindered by rigid preconditions, demand for unconditional surrender, and an unwillingness to engage with the conflict's historical roots. These preset terms in different forms continue to define the present negotiations. The Nagas perceive these attitudes of the successive Indian governments and bureaucracies as condescending, paternalistic and dismissive, often reflecting a microscopic understanding of Naga history and aspirations. India’s consistent attempt to reinterpret, dilute, and distort historical facts have yielded little progress, contributing instead to the prolongation of one of South Asia's oldest unresolved political questions.
The historical record that Nagas did not voluntarily merge with either India or Burma is unambiguous. No treaty of accession was concluded, no popular mandate was sought, nor was any democratic process undertaken through which the Naga people freely consented to be governed by either state. Instead, sovereignty according to India and Myanmar were assumed and enforced through the logic of colonial inheritance, whereby territories once administered by the British were simply transferred to successor states without regard for the wishes of the indigenous inhabitants.
In light of these realities, India has little moral or historical basis to label the Nagas as secessionists, terrorists, rebels, or anti-national elements. Secession presupposes prior lawful integration; rebellion presupposes allegiance; and terrorism presupposes the absence of a legitimate political grievance. Historical evidence points to a different conclusion. The Nagas constitute a politically subjugated people whose ancestral territory remains under external occupation and administration on the basis of inherited colonial arrangements rather than freely expressed consent.
Rather than portraying the Nagas as secessionists, it would be more accurate to recognize them as a people seeking the restoration of rights they never voluntarily relinquished. Rather than dismissing the Naga political movement as rebellion, it should be understood as the continuation of a historical struggle for political recognition and self-determination. Rather than criminalizing a people's aspiration for freedom, India and Myanmar ought to confront the uncomfortable realities of history and acknowledge that unresolved questions of sovereignty cannot be permanently buried beneath military power, administrative control, or political rhetoric.
The principle that might cannot create right remains as relevant today as it was in the nineteenth century. Military force may occupy territory, but it cannot manufacture legitimacy. Armies may secure borders, yet they cannot extinguish a people’s memory of who they are. Empires may draw lines across maps, but they cannot erase nation whose roots runs deeper than the ink that marks those boundaries. It is therefore high time that both India and Myanmar abandon the lingering assumptions inherited from the colonial era and engage with the Naga issue in a spirit of honesty, genuinity, and mutual respect. A durable and honourable peace can only emerge from the recognition of historical truths and from a sincere commitment to the democratic principle that all peoples possess the inherent right to determine their own political destiny.
Issued by
The Ministry of Rali Wali Affairs,
NNC/FGN, under the leadership of Zhopra Vero