Delhi's mantra for North East The three stage plan
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: May 29, 2012 -

Delhi appears to have wrapped it up. A three way model to bring peace to the North East region-inking a ceasefire pact with the armed groups, entering into a political negotiation and economic development of the States-and the state of hallucination in which the political mandarins of the country have worked themselves into cannot get more murky than this.

Top this off with the model they have to offer-the ceasefire agreements and the political negotiations with the two factions of the NSCN-and the script is ready to churn out yet another road map to peace yarn.

On the other hand, the Centre cannot go wrong on this count, for any peace deal will surely revolve around the question of first ceasing hostilities and then entering into meaningful political dialogues with the armed groups.

The question is how does the political establishment of the country hope to bring the different armed groups to the negotiating table ?

This is a question which Delhi has not bothered to study with the sincerity it merits and nothing reflects this better than trumping the cease fire agreements with the two factions of the NSCN as the model for a road map to peace.

Political naivety may have a cure for this can be treated with the right dose of familiarising the people concerned with the issues besetting the North East region, particularly Manipur, but when this ‘naivety’ is borne out of a deliberate reluctance to see the truth, then all attempts to politically resolve the issues besetting a State like Manipur may be given a quiet burial.

It is this refusal to see things in its correct perspective which has been the primary reason for the guns to keep booming in a place like Manipur for decades, without any end in sight. Certain mind frames have to be dismantled to deal with the issue in the first place.

Firstly Delhi should have the courage and the conviction to admit that the issues plaguing the North East, particularly Manipur are political in nature and not a law and order problem.

An abnormal situation should have a time frame, it cannot go on forever.

An example in case is the continuing imposition of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, wherein the country has been made to think and come under the impression that the situation in the North East region can be tackled only through a military Act, thereby militarising the region which has had the effect of a force multiplier, leading to the birth of so many armed groups, instead of resolving the situation.

Any political attempt to resolve the situation in the North East should therefore rests on the premise that Delhi first accepts that the issues confronting the region and the people are political in nature.

The myopia created by the militaristic approach can only be cured by removing the fogged lens, through which Delhi has been focusing on the issues in the region. Instead of talking about the three stage plan, Delhi would make more sense by demonstrating that it accepts that the issues here are political and cannot be resolved with gun power.

It would also help for the political leaders at Delhi to realise that the cease fire pacts with the Naga rebel factions cannot serve as role models for the other armed groups operating in the region for the simple reason that peace is still a far cry in the places where the ceasefire has been officially enforced.

If there is peace, as is understood in its universal context, why is the Armed Forces Special Powers Act still enforced in Nagaland ?

Turn this argument on its head and the natural question that follows is why is AFSPA necessary to deal with issues which are political in nature and therefore out of the ambit of the military ?