WEDNESDAY, JUNE 04, 2025
Who is an Indigenous Inhabitant of Nagaland?
Published on May 31, 2025
By EMN
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Indigenous:- Indigenous derives from the Latin noun indigena (meaning "native"), which was formed by combining old Latin indu (meaning "in" or "within") with the verb gignere (meaning "to beget"). Another term that comes from the indigena root is indigene, a word for a plant or animal that lives, grows, or originates in a certain area. Indigenous is used in scientific contexts to describe organisms and the habitats to which they belong. Most often however, it is used to describe the native inhabitants of a place.
- According to Oxford dictionary, indigenous means originating or occurring naturally in a particular place especially plants and animals. It can also refer to people who are the original inhabitants of a region, or who have lived in a place for a very long time before others arrived. This is often used in the context of indigenous peoples or cultures, who are the original inhabitants of a region.
- According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, indigenous means native to a particular region or environment. It refers to that which is produced, growing, living, or occurring natively or naturally in a particular region or environment. Indigenous is of, relating to, or descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a place and especially of a place that was colonised.
- In the UN, “Indigenous” is used to refer broadly to peoples of long settlement and connection to specific lands who have been adversely affected by incursions by industrial economies, displacement, and settlement of their traditional territories by others.
- Indigenous, therefore, refers to those originating or occurring naturally in a particular place; (of people) inhabiting or existing in a land from the earliest times or from before the arrival of colonists. It, therefore, refers to that which has originated or occurring naturally in a particular place since time immemorial. Indigenous applies to that which is not only native but which, as far as can be determined, has never been introduced or brought from elsewhere. Indigenous are aboriginals which imply having no known others preceding in occupancy of a particular region. Synonyms of indigenous are native, endemic, local, domestic, aboriginals. Its opposites are non-native, introduced, foreign and imported.
- Naturally, all people can and should be traced to a land or to a geographic region or land to which they or their families, clan or race is indigenous. Migration of population has caused people to live in multiracial multicultural pluralistic society. There appears to be confusion and interchange amongst the terminologies of indigenous people, indigenous inhabitant, domicile, permanent citizens and citizenship. A residential township or habitation may consist of different categories of citizens of which some will be indigenous; some would be domiciles with permanent residency and some immigrants forming temporary floating population. While the differences may be downplayed and therefore made to appear innocuous, the implications are far and wide that threatens the fabric of indigenous identity.
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- Indigenous People and Indigenous Inhabitants:
- According to the Oxford dictionary, indigenous people refer to the original inhabitants of a place, meaning they lived there long before others settled there, or their descendants. It also applies to those who consider themselves distinct from other groups in the prevailing society and who are committed to preserving their ancestral territories and ethnic identity. It refers to those people and nations that have a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories and consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing in those territories (or parts of them). They exhibit a determination to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions, and legal systems.
- Indigenous inhabitants refer to the original people or groups of people who lived in a specific area before others arrived and settled there. There are indigenous people spread across various regions of the world and recognised as indigenous people. However, the indigeneity of a person to one place does not entitle them to be indigenous to another place where they do not naturally belong to, for the mere sake of their status of being indigenous. The terminologies of ‘Indigenous peoples’ and ‘Indigenous inhabitants’ are often confused and the distinction must be understood in its context. Any descendants whose ancestors were the original inhabitants of a land are considered as indigenous people to that land and those that inhabit that specific land to which their ancestry and history is traced only can be called the indigenous inhabitant of that land alone. By definition, it cannot include another citizen who migrated from another place no matter how indigenous he may be to that place from which he comes from.
- There are various Naga tribes spread across various parts of the region and divided by arbitrary state boundaries. The meaning of Indigenous Inhabitant of Nagaland is not synonymous to the indigenous Naga tribe that may be scattered across the various states created by arbitrary boundaries. While the Nagas irrespective of whichever state they have been arbitrarily demarcated to belong, their attachment to their land that forms their identity will naturally form the foundation of their indigeneity. Every indigenous Naga belonging to a Naga tribe can be traced to a land whose ancestors inhabited, and can only be as much indigenous inhabitant of that land. Therefore, if a Naga whose land has been demarcated into another state other than Nagaland, will still remain a Naga but will have become a Naga indigenous inhabitant of the land of that state to which his land falls. Such an understanding is common sense because Nagas identify themselves not only through their bloodline, their clan, their ancestry, their culture, their customs and traditions, but also through their land. The people are indigenous to the land and not to the nomenclature of the State that came about much later. Thus the phrase ‘our land, our identity’. Not only was this identity so distinct, but also defining of the Nagas that much before India’s aggression over the Nagas and their land, the British had introduced the Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation (BEFR), also known as the Inner Line Regulation, in 1873 to protect the distinctive culture, customs, traditions, land and the society of the Nagas. The significance of this BEFR and its intent cannot be undermined and which is why in the case of Nagas, the article 371A not only found its place in the constitution of India to acknowledge the social, cultural and religious practices of the Nagas but also to safeguard it. Thus, even among the Naga tribes, each tribe can be attributed to a geographical region which can be attributed to a land which in turn can be attributed to a native village and further down to the minutest proof of ancestry through clan and family and proof of its ancestors having lived for several years before the advent of any foreigners or outsiders or colonist to influence their natural existence.
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- With the British exerting control and authority over the land of the Nagas against their wishes, and the various wars fought against them that testify to this fact, the colonial rulers had the administrative advantage of formulating rules and its regulation that the Nagas barely understood or did not understand at all, and which was thrusted upon them. Many non-Naga population from different areas migrated as helpers or soldiers or workhorses and paid labourers of the British soldiers and officers to serve wherever they were taken. And as rewards of their service, they were granted recognition and settlement. Irrespective of however those floating migrants and workers and helpers were rewarded, it is clear that they were not indigenous to the new place they were imported into. And because they were never indigenous, such persons and their descendants can never be indigenous to the new place they have been made to settle. Unlike citizenship, indigeneity cannot be granted nor awarded. It is not measured by duration of time nor by the numbers of population. It is not a subject of democratic majority nor determined by Govt. orders. Indigeneity is a cultural practice and not a judicial practice. In spite of the Europeans who colonised and settled in the United States of America 246 years ago and has even outgrown the Indigenous Inhabitants known as the Red Indians, not a single migrant population and their descendants who have becomes citizens of America, neither by their length of stay nor by the strength of majority, has till date become an indigenous inhabitant of America or became a Red Indian.
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- The non-indigenous settlers:
- Among the inhabitants of Nagaland, there are non-Nagas that has migrated from other parts of India as well as Nagas that have migrated from other Naga-dominated areas in other states but not indigenous to the present state of Nagaland. Some have resided for considerably long period of time and can be granted domicile status or permanent resident as per the provision of law. However, no length of stay will change the fact that they were never the original or earliest or first settlers, and therefore, do not merit to be granted the status of ‘Indigenous Inhabitant of Nagaland’.
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- The way forward:
- While citizenship or domicile status may be granted by the lawful authority, it is a bad law to classify or to grant the Indigenous inhabitant status by the Government of Nagaland based on a cut off year which dilutes the meaning of indigenous inhabitant.
- Therefore, the indigeneity of an indigenous inhabitant of Nagaland should consider these factors: The ancestry can be traced to the earliest settlers since time immemorial. This can be ascertained by the family and clan in the native village. The native village they originally belong to will have existed since time immemorial and have defined borders and jurisdictions within Nagaland. His relatives and clansmen will be relatable and associated with the native village and its jurisdictions. Acceptance by the family and clan of an indigenous community of the land.
- Indigeneity cannot and should not be determined by a person’s name in the electoral list or having a land patta or house tax been paid prior to 1963 or the size of a village, the population size of a village, or the wealth of a person or length of stay by a cut-off year. A non-indigenous inhabitant of Nagaland remains to be a non-indigenous inhabitant of Nagaland forever and ever as it is in America.
- For too long, the people have been misled by a misconception or a perversion of the truth and the true meaning of indigenous inhabitant. The state government has recently nullified all existing notifications, guidelines and orders in respect of indigeneity of a person. It is only appropriate that it employs and ratify the true and the rightful meaning of Indigenous Inhabitant by discarding earlier Bad Laws. According to the UN, the most fruitful approach is to identify rather than define indigenous people. The Indigenous Inhabitant of Nagaland must be granted only to those who are truly Indigenous to and truly a tribe of Nagaland. Any deviation from this is a corruption of the law.
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- By
- Kethozhapu Sahu, Kevisiezolie Suohu, Dr. Viketoulie Pienyü, Kekuosetuo Nakhro, Mehozol Hibo, Tepungosa Sale, Melie Nakhro, Robert N. Solo, Peteroko Meyase, Dr. Thepfüdi Shüya, Lhouphrevilie Rino, Kevichatha, Chol Ltu, Savilie Kruneilie, Vineipra K. Pienyü GB, Lhousavi Kipu GB, Kuolachalie Seyie, Dr. Villo Naleo, Thepfülhouvi Solo.
Nagaland Districts
