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Terrorised by Terrorists |
Dimapur: the knock
is tentative at first. Then insistent. The man
is getting impatient. I
open the door to the room of the hotel where I have booked in for the night to
a hotel employee who says there is someone to see me, can I down to the lobby,
and withdraws. S I wonder which of the NGOs I had fixed appointments with has
turned up, a man barges into the room, wearing a matching grey jacket and
trousers with an open necked shirt. To my surprised query, I catch some words
and phrases he utters like “misbehaviour” and “check your room”. My initial
feeling of outrage turns fear when he declares he is from the NSCN (an
underground group fighting for an independent Nagaland). Another man enters
the room. He casually brushes aside his jacket to reveal the handle of a
pistol protruding from the waist. He looks menacingly at me.
Fear makes me desperate and I begin to shout all kinds of gibberish…..
It
is in such a context that the NGOs in Nagaland have to operate. On the one
hand is the underground which is accused of committing atrocities, and on the
other is the army which too is blamed for much the same. Between the devil
and the deep blue sea describes the situation within which the voluntary
sector of the state is trapped. Trapped or not, the NGOs are doing a valiant
job.
Take the Naga People’s Movement for Human Rights which filed a case against the army and forced it to pay compensation to the families of the men who “disappeared” thanks to its operations. Within the courts and without the NGO deals with the challenges to human rights that arise daily in the state. Its convenor, Neingulo Krome, declares that the army, present in Nagaland ever since 1947, has directed its fire more often at civilian populations than the underground. For after a terrorist attack the former are subjected to search and seizure and not infrequently the youngsters seeing their parents manhandled, even tortured, get antagonised and help to swell the ranks of the underground.
The underground poses a threat to the safety and security of people. While it has ruthlessly eliminated “informers” (those providing intelligence to the army) it has been extracting tributes from all and sundry. The government servants are paying 25 percent of their salaries to it. The problem has been compounded by the split in the movement which was launched by the Naga National Council (NNC) led by A.Z. Phizon – he died in London. After the Shillong Accord of 1975 several underground leaders agreed to surrender arms and reached an agreement with the government. A break-away group led by Muivah and Isaak, which did not accept the accord, formed the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN).
Thus there are two factions and often enough both the factions may demand money. The government servants of some departments are surrendering as much as 50 percent of their salary. It was precisely became the NGO, Nagaland Gandhi Ashram did not want to pay “security allowance” to the terrorists that it had to close shop and move from Chu-Chu-Yimlang in Mokochung district. For the terrorists had warned Natwar Thakkar, its head, that he would not be safe if the NGO did not shell out. Now Thakkar is re-located in Guwahati and is in charge of the decentralised northeast division of CAPART.
(The underground has split further. The NSCN has another faction led by S.S. Khalpang and while the major faction of NNC is led by Phizo’s daughter another one is headed by Khodao Yanthan, both of whom live in London.
Human rights NGOs have to operate more directly within the political ethos of a society. Development and environment NGOs too have to contend with it (Some maintain that the political ethos does not effect them too obviously).
….My shouts attract the hotel staff. The manager builds up enough courage to request them to leave. But before doing so one of them hisses “We’ll be back”. Outside the room, followed by the hotel staff, he turns around and yells, “You cannot get away”.
I find myself shaking. What has brought this on, what have I done to draw the attention of the underground, if that is what they represent. My questions have sought basic information, they have not been directed at any particular group. Who has tipped them off? Is the hotel staff involved? Are they goondas taking advantage of the peculiar situation of repression in the state to extract what they can…a host of questions besiege my mind.
The hotel manager is sufficiently alarmed to ask me to switch my room. He makes me sign the register to show I have left the hotel. I barricade myself within, turn off the lights and settle down to wait out the night.
I decide I will not open the door no matter who knocks. If they are criminal elements and do return, then they will have to break down the door to get me. If they are indeed from a terrorist a terrorist group, then they will certainly knock it down and nothing can save me….I think of Bolin Bordoloi the Tata executive whom Bodo rebels had kept in captivity for over a year…
| A look at the work of the development and environment NGOs in Nagaland gives us an idea of the nature of their contribution: | |
| ● | The comprehensive Rural Development Services (CRDS) launched in 1981, has as its objective rural welfare under which its focus is strengthening the community through socio-economic development programmes. Among the projects it has launched, several relate to raising agricultural production and productivity to benefit tribal communities. Training is an important component of the NGO’s work which is arranged for various categories of development workers to ensure a more effective implementation of development projects. It also seeks to improve “occupational proficiency of rural people”. Experts are obtained from various disciplines – available with government departments and NGOs – to train farmers in a range of development activities, in particular agriculture, horticulture and dairy farming. Another significant target group of CRDS comprises project officers of church associations involved in development programmes. At one stage it organised 20 training programmes a year. Reverend L. Bizo is the director of CRDS which is located at Darogapathar near Dimapur. |
| ● | The Council for Social Service (CSS), established in 1977, headquartered at Kohima has four branches, one each at Tuensang, Mokokchung, Khuzama and Diphupar. It has 18 health care centre in the countryside which provide regular check-ups. Those who have benefitted include pregnant women, children (immunisation) and the aged. About the last category, the CSS pamphlet notes”. Earlier, the elders enjoyed traditional respect: now the traditions are crumbling fast, leaving many of them out in the cold with their problems”. Among the more unusual activities of CSS is the promotion of “decentralised pig fattening centres”. As its brochure notes “In keeping with the high demand for pork among the Naga people and in order to provide an additional source of income to needy women, financial support was extended to them to pursue their traditional practice of pig rearing; the rate of interest was six percent to be repaid in four years….Piggery being a very lucrative business, this project can raise the income level of each family”. |
| ● | The Church’s Auxiliary for Social Action (CASA) has projects in four of the seven districts of the state promoting horticulture and dairy farming. They were initiated over 10 years ago and S.P. henry of CASA informs us that they have had some spread effect. At the Dimaspur project site of CASA there are plots where indigenous medicinal plants are being cultivated to provide medical aid to the villagers. For village doctors have migrated and the knowledge of indigenous medicines has vanished. These need to be revived for we are informed that the government is unable to cope with the health requirement of the tribal villages. “It cannot even provide cotton wool”, said a practitioner of indigenous medicine, even as he explained the curative properties of a plant. |
| ● | Obviously provision of medicinal facilities is a priority “felt need” of the people are several NGOs are addressing it. The Nagaland Institute of Health Environment and Social Welfare in Kohima launched its operations with a charitable homeopathic dispensary. A mobile medical van began touring the rural areas of all seven districts with cassettes on rural hygiene. The common ailments are diarrhoea, dysentary, with skin diseases, malaria and goitre being prevalent in certain pockets. As regards environment, the NGO is focussing on spreading the importance of conservation through school teachers and NGOs. |
| ● | The group, Study and Action for Comprehensive Development (SADC), based in Dimapur, is essentially into promoting awareness of the government’s rural development programmes. As its founder Khriebu Bizo observed, one reason for these not percolating to the target population was its unawareness about them. If the marginalised tribals, in the main those living in the hinterland – were made conscios of their right to benefit by them, that they were infact meant for them (let alone the specific advantages they confer), then and only then would the anti-poverty projects have the desired impact. At present, these are being cornered by members of the relatively well of sections of Nagaland’d society (as is the case in much of the country). |
| ● | The Ao Union has two objectives (I) raise the income of marginal/small farmers and (ii) promote afforestation. It seeks to attain these by distributing teak saplings. It obtains the seeds at nominal cost, develops them into saplings at its field base in Dimapur and then at minimal cost provides them to farmers. The full-grown teak trees fetches a good price for them. |
| ● | There are NGOs that see bringing the tribes together as the crucial need of the hour. The Alliance for Social Harmony and Development Alternatives (ASHDA) located at Diphupar (near Dimapur) is headed by R.L. Jamir, former secretary, department of rural development, government of Nagaland. The focus ASHDA is to try and unite the various tribes, a tough task for there is much inter-and-intra tribal rivalry. Jamir close to launch the NGO in Diphupar since it has as many as 18 tribes. It is a “cosmopolitan village and an ideal place to launch the experiment. It even has Nagas from Manipur”, said Jamir. The efforts at unity are sought to be achieved through inter-marriages (among different Naga tribes) and cultural activities. Jamir took this writer to a cultural show where there was a vigorous dance performance by students wearing head dresses with strikingly large black feathers with white/yellow stripes across them: they looked suspiciously like a hornbill’s feathers. (Memories of the visit to Periyar sanctuary with a hornbill lazily gliding over our boat exploring the lake). Indeed, they were, we were informed; the “brighter” ones were artificial, now that the hornbill was on the endangered list and killing it prohibited. |
| ● | The Naga Mothers Association (NMA) in Kohima run a (I) de-addiction cum rehabilitation centre and (ii) counselling centre for alcoholics and drug addicts These activities were taken up in 1989 by when it was founded in 1984, the NGO’s objective was to “fight anti-social activities”, explained the project co-ordinator Leichu Angami who after her schooling in Kohima trained with KRIPA in Bombay for three years in drug rehabilitation techniques. |
….. throughout the evening and into the night people knock on the door. I get tense on each occasion but remain seated on the sofa, maintaining the pretence that the room is empty. Perhaps a hotel staffer has knocked to ask if I want dinner, or provide the mosquito repellent. But I cannot afford to take chances. What if he is in league with the goons.
I doze fitfully; in a state of half-sleep, half-wakefulness Hemingway’s description of the big Swede, a former heavyweight boxer waiting in his room for his killers to get him, surfaces from the unconscious. When someone comes to warn him to get going for the killers are on their way, he thanks the informant, but makes no effort to get up form his bed where he continues to lie, resigned to his fate…
Drug addiction has emerged as a major problem affecting the youth and is symbolic of changes taking place in Naga society. NGOs in the field observe that prior to the impact of the massive assistance by the Centre, and the development programmes being implemented, were the changes that Christian missionaries – American, not British – had wrought. Through their dedication and zeal, as well as the educational and health services they provided, they have brought about an attitudinal change among the tribals almost all of who now are Christians.
Just as there are those who are unhappy with the changes introduced as a result of the “development strategy” of the government, there are those who maintain that Christianity has adversely affected the tribal way of life. Leichu Angami of NMA said that alcohol was in common use before the missionaries came; they preached against drinking, the tribal who converted gave it up; gradually the momentum built up against alcohol and now Nagaland is dry state. The consequence of this change has been far worse. Leichu is convinced that the Naga youth would not have taken to drugs in such a big way if alcohol consumption had not been prohibited.
In the late seventies heroin began to be brought into Nagaland from the golden triangle. And its consumption among the youth has shot up. They are particularly vulnerable because the education – part of the development strategy – alienates them from the land; they do not want to go back to farming. Yet the quality of education is not good enough to secure them jobs. The resultant frustration is another cause for many turning to drugs.
A Naga couple came to the NMA centre while while I was talking to Leichu Angami. The tale of the father related apparently is a common one. His son, unable to find employment, has sunk gradually into the drug habit. The father had taken him to Calcutta where the treatment seemed to have cured him. On his return, the boy – in his later twenties – had again begun to take drugs, but surreptitiously. It was his defiant behaviour that led to the discovery that he was back on drugs. The father pleaded with Leichu Angam to admit their son to the de-addiction cum rehabilitation centre. Leichu explained that unless he came willingly they would be unable to keep him at the centre, or else the parents should make it clear that he would not be welcome at home, even if it meant telling him that they would report his habit to the police.
…When I open my eyes again I see the light of morning filter through the curtains. Relief floods through my body. They have not come after all, I am safe.
But what if they
appear now, when one least suspects they will. The black revolutionary leader
Angela Davis has asked “If they come in the morning” what could one do.
Nothing….
An NGO has following Chinese proverb printed on its brochure
If you plan for one year
plant rice
If you plan for ten years
plant trees
If you plan for hundred years
plant men
Clearly some long range planning is necessary if the dilemma posed by the peculiar situation prevalent in Nagaland can be tackled.
An NGO member argued that their traditional religion (animism, worship of nature) provided them the moorings, the stability that has since been destroyed. Whatever be the reason, it is within this context of modernity and tradition – the challenge posed by change – that the NGOs have to operate. The other context, already discussed, is the dilemma created by the presence of the army on the one hand, and the underground on the other. Nagaland is a state under siege, a siege within and without. q
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