16 years of political dialogue yet to come to fruition ; GoI has exhausted political will : NSCN-IM
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, November 03 2013: Sixteen years after the NSCN-IM signed a ceasefire pact with the Government of India, and after several rounds of peace parleys, the collective leadership of the rebel outfit now feels that Indian leaders have exhausted their political will to take forward the peace process or bring it to a conclusion.

A reliable source informed that the NSCN-IM leadership put up some concrete proposals sometime back before New Delhi to bring a solution to the ongoing Indo-Naga peace process.

Although the proposals were put up more than a year back, GoI still maintained they have been examining the proposals.

During the last round of peace talk between Indian leaders and leaders of the outfit, the two sides agreed to translate into action some of the proposals put up a year back.

However, there is no sign of the Government of India keeping its commitment till date.

Isak Swu, Dr Manmohan Singh and Muivah

The ongoing peace process initiated in 1997 to resolve the Naga issue is now 16 years old.

Even though both the sides have been negotiating on different points during the last 16 years, Indian leaders now seemed to have exhausted their political will to take forward the peace process.

The Government of India exposed itself when it shelved the ordinance aimed at protecting convicted law-makers after AICC Vice-President Rahul Gandhi burst out against the same ordinance in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's ruling which rejected any sort of protection to convicted law-makers.

Given such a character of GoI and the prevailing situation, it is unlikely that the GoI would take any significant step to bring the Naga issue to a logical conclusion.

It is unlikely that GoI would take up any visible step to implement any of the proposals put up by the collective leadership of NSCN-IM one year back.

Nonetheless, Nagaland Chief Minister and his Council of Ministers have been keeping in touch with Indian leaders on the matter even though nothing positive has been achieved so far.

For the Lok Sabha election scheduled next year, AICC has asked MPCC to suggest certain issues/points about Manipur for inclusion in the election manifesto.

On being enquired if Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee has received any such intimation from AICC on the issues of Nagaland, particularly the Indo-Naga peace process, the source informed that India is under Congress party's rule and NSCN-IM has no faith in political parties like Congress which has no political will.

Pointing out that the question of bringing a solution to the Naga issue is clearly written in the constitution of NPF, the source further disclosed that NSCN-IM has some faith in BJP which has forged some sort of an alliance with NPF but the outfit has lost all its faith in Congress party.

Notably, a single BJP candidate was elected in the last Nagaland Assembly election and Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio gave the post of Parliamentary Secretary to the BJP MLA.

It would not serve any meaningful purpose in talking with other political parties like Congress ahead of the Lok Sabha election for NPF has been working hard to bring a solution to the Indo-Naga issue, added the source.