State, Policy and Conflicts in Northeast India 9781138930643, 9781315680217

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State, Policy and Conflicts in Northeast India

This book discusses the history of unrest and conflict in Northeast India from 1947 to the present day. A perceptive study on public policy and its delivery in the region, the volume highlights that a crisis of governance, security and development has emerged in the Northeast because of the way various government institutions and agencies have been functioning in the area. It uses case studies to illuminate conflict dynamics in the two erstwhile princely states of Manipur and Tripura, along with in-depth discussions on Assam and Nagaland. Drawing upon major policy documents, on-the-ground experience and rare insight, the book examines Centre–state relations, the armed forces, special acts, human rights and larger policy-level questions confronting the region. It also underlines the key role of the Northeastern states in India’s Look East Policy. Cogent and authentic, this book will be useful to scholars and researchers of security studies, peace and conflict studies, area studies, Indian politics and history, and particularly those interested in Northeast India. K. S. Subramanian is an independent researcher and former senior official of the Union Home Ministry, Government of India.

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State, Policy and Conflicts in Northeast India

K. S. Subramanian

First published 2016 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2016 K. S. Subramanian The right of K. S. Subramanian to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-1-138-93064-3 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-68021-7 (ebk) Typeset in Galliard by Apex CoVantage, LLC

For my parents

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Contents

Map List of tables Preface Acknowledgements List of abbreviations 

Introduction: conflicts and the State: context and contours

viii ix xi xiii xv

1

1 Conflicts in the Northeast: the policy process

16

2 A Manipur case study

29

3 A Tripura case study

89

4 Assam Rifles and Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act 1958: analysis and policy

143

5 Conflicts and the state: whither Northeast India?

158

Appendixes References Index

181 201 209

I N D I A

N

NORTH-EAST ZONE MAP

AL CH NA ESH U AR RAD P

SIKKIM Itanagar

BHUTAN Dispur

ASSAM

NAGALAND Kohima

Shillong MEGHALAYA

BIHAR

BANGLADESH Agartala

JHARKHAND

TRIPURA WEST BENGAL

Imphal MANIPUR Aizawal MIZORAM MAYANMAR

LEGEND ODISHA (ORISSA)

International Boundary State Boundary State Capital

Conflict Zones in Northeast India

Tables

A1.1 Seven states of Northeast India: area and population A1.2 Representation of Northeastern states in Indian parliament A1.3 Incidence of violence in the Northeast A1.4 Incidence of cognizable crimes under the Indian penal code 1981 to 2003 A1.5 Incidents of terrorist violence in NER, 2004–06 A1.6 Strength of police force in NER, 1981–2003 A1.7 Expenditure on police and training in NER, 2000–01 to 2004–05  A1.8 Status of militancy in NER states, 2003–04 A1.9 Police in Northeast India

181 181 182 183 183 183 184 184 185

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Preface

This book is a product of my professional experience as the longest serving Director of the Research and Policy (R&P) Division in the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), Government of India, supplemented by field experience in the Northeast especially Manipur and Tripura where I remained a senior official who ended up as the Director General of the State Institute of Public Administration and Rural Development (SIPARD), Tripura (1993–97). My academic experience outside the government has of course been most useful. During my tenure in the MHA in the 1980s, conflict issues in Northeast India were a matter of major concern. The late Professor B. K. Roy Burman, a scholar on the Northeast, had suggested that the ministry should set up a Technical Consultative Committee (TCC) to deal with conflict issues in the region. An interdisciplinary study cum action group consisting of civil servants, scholars and activists would go into major conflict issues and come up with policy recommendations. The then Home Secretary T.C.A. Srinivasavaradan who was receptive suggested that we consult the Ministry of Defence (MoD), a major actor in the Northeast. The response was negative, perhaps because it was reluctant to share its classified information with any such group. The differences between the two ministries on matters relating to the region would emerge sharply in the subsequent period. The role of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act 1958 (AFSPA) in the region was a key issue. In July 2004, Ms Thangjam Manorama was raped and killed allegedly by men of the Assam Rifles (AR), ‘the oldest paramilitary force in India’

xii Preface

deployed in the Northeast and an unprecedented naked protest by Manipuri women in front of the AR HQs in Imphal, took place. This led the MHA, in an apparently diversionary move, to set up the Justice B. P. Jeevan Reddy Committee to examine the role of the AFSPA in the region. The Committee’s critical report, submitted in 2005, was never made public though a copy is available in the public domain. Significantly, the AR, a central paramilitary force operating under the draconian AFSPA, is under the ‘dual control’ of the MHA and the MoD, which means in practice no mechanism for serious control of the force and its behaviour in the Northeast. My subsequent experience in the Northeast, which included training experience as Director General of the SIPARD in Tripura, brought home to me the need for better understanding of the Government of India’s policy approach and attitude to the Northeast. My opportunity to do this came when in November 2009, I visited Manipur as part of a fact-finding team to examine and report on human rights violations by security forces in the state. The report of the team brought out several key issues which needed further examination. The Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), New Delhi awarded me a senior fellowship in 2011 to explore and write on these issues. It has been a pleasure for me to produce the present volume on the subject as well as the volume of edited essays on ‘Security, Governance and Democratic Governance: Essays on the Northeast’ (Niyogi, 2014).

Acknowledgements

I have incurred many debts in the course of writing this book. I am grateful for the cooperation of many people I have worked with in Manipur and Tripura as well as in the Union Home Ministry. I would like to thank Dr C. J. Thomas, Director of the ICSSR Regional Centre, Shillong, for helping me to conduct a seminar at the Centre, which was lively. However, not all the invited persons were able to come. The present volume, which pays special attention to Manipur and Tripura, takes into account the experience of the other two major conflict-affected states of Nagaland and Assam in Chapter 5. The other volume that came out of my research on the Northeast mentioned earlier contributes to the present study as well. I intend to carry forward my work on the remaining states of the region in the future. I have interacted with and learnt from many scholars, activists and others in the region. I am grateful to the ICSSR, New Delhi, for the fellowship and the Council for Social Development (CSD), New Delhi, for providing me the necessary institutional framework. I would like to thank the Union Home Ministry for supporting my seminar in Shillong and the associated travel expenditure. My thanks are also due to Malathi, Arun and Ashvin.

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Abbreviations

ABSU All Bodo Students Union ADC Autonomous District Council AFSPA Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 AIDWA All India Democratic Women’s Movement Association ANVC Achik National Volunteer Council AR Assam Rifles ATPLO All Tripura People’s Liberation Organization ATTF All Tripura Tiger Force BIMSTEC Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Techno-Economic Cooperation BLT Bodo Liberation Tigers BSF Border Security Force CAPFs Central Armed Police Forces (CRPF and others) CCC Committee of Concerned Citizens CHT Chittagong Hill Tracts CI Counter Insurgency CPF Central Paramilitary Force (Assam Rifles) CPI Communist Party of India CPI (M) Communist Party of India (Marxist) CRPF Central Reserve Police Force Director General of Police DGP DHD Dima Hasao Daoga DHD/J Dima Hasao Daoga (Jowel) DHD/N Dima Hasao Daoga (Nunisa) DONER (Ministry of) Development of the North Eastern Region

xvi Abbreviations

ENPO GOI GOM GOT GMP GMR GSDP HDI HRLN HRW IB ICS ICSSR IIC INC IP IPC IPS IPT IRB JMS JSS KCP KLNLF KNA KNF KNO KLA KLO KRA KYKL LEP MEA MHA MHDR MKS MLA

East Nagaland People’s Organization Government of India Government of Manipur Government of Tripura Gana Mukti Parishad Greater Mekong Region Gross State Domestic Product Human Development Index Human Rights Law Network Human Rights Watch Intelligence Bureau Indian Civil Service Indian Council of Social Science Research India International Centre Indian National Congress Indian Police Indian Penal Code Indian Police Service Independent People’s Tribunal India Reserve Battalions Jana Mongal Samiti Jana Sakhya Samiti Kangleipak Communist Party Karbi Longri National Liberation Front Kuki National Association Kuki National Front Kuki National Organization Kuki Liberation Army Kuki Liberation Organization Kuki Revolutionary Army Kanglei Yawol Kanba Lup Look East Policy Ministry of External Affairs Ministry of Home Affairs Manipur Human Development Report Manipur Krishak Sangha Manipur Liberation Army

Abbreviations xvii

MNF Mizo National Front MoD Ministry of Defence MPM Manipur Praja Mandal Manipur Praja Sammilini MPS MR Manipur Rifles MSD Manipur State Durbar NDFB National Democratic Front of Bodoland NDFB/P National Democratic Front of Bodoland/ Progressive NEC North Eastern Council NER North Eastern Region NGO Non-Government Organization NH National Highway NHMM Nikhil Hindu Manipuri Mahasabha NIRD National Institute of Rural Development NLFT National Liberation Front of Tripura NMM Nikhil Manipuri Mahasabha NSA National Security Advisor NSCN-(IM) National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah) NSCN-(K) National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Khaplang) NSSO National Sample Survey Organization PLA People’s Liberation Army PMS Police Modernisation Scheme PREPAK People’s Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak SAHRDC South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre SARC Second Administrative Reforms Commission SRE Security Related Expenditure SSCDCM Sixth Schedule Council Demand Committee, Manipur TFR Tripura Resurrection Army THDR Tripura Human Development Report, 2007 TNV Tripura National Volunteers TPM Tripura Praja Mandal TRA Tripura Revolutionary Army

xviii Abbreviations

TSF Tripura Students Front TSR Tripura State Rifles TTAADC Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council Tripura Upajati Juba Samiti TUJS UAPA Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 UBLF United Bengali Liberation Front ULFA United Liberation Front of Assam UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNLF United National Liberation Front, Manipur UPDS United People’s Democratic Solidarity

Introduction Conflicts and the State: context and contours

Without a proper understanding of the complex histories of the North-eastern peoples and the evolution of their fractious rebel movements and fragile alliances, no progress can be made in achieving peace in the Northeast. Bertil Lintner, 2012

This book on conflicts and the State in Northeast India is intended as an exercise in policy analysis in the broad national context. It is based on my professional experience in the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in the Government of India as well as the Northeast especially the states of Manipur and Tripura. Assam, Nagaland, Manipur and Tripura have been the major conflict-affected states in the Northeast roughly since independence in 1947. Apart from Sikkim, the other three states in the region, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh have by no means been free of conflict though to a lesser extent. This book provides case studies of the conflict situation in Manipur and Tripura where I was posted for many years. Such case studies are not attempted here in respect of Nagaland and Assam, which have been studied in detail elsewhere (Lintner, 2012; Mahanta, 2013). The last chapter of this book attempts a summation of the ongoing conflict scenario and State response in the four states of Manipur, Tripura, Nagaland and Assam. The focus has mainly been on the neglected aspect of central government policy making and implementation, involving the role of

2  Introduction: conflicts and the State

regulatory institutions such as the MHA, the ‘nodal’ agency for the Northeast and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and development institutions such as the Ministry for the Development of the Northeastern Region (DONER) and the North Eastern Council (NEC). Also specially examined here are the roles of the Assam Rifles (AR), the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958, Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) and the India Reserve (IR) battalions as well as the roles of the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and the Indian Army besides the special security laws used in the region (albeit briefly). The long festering conflicts in the Northeast of India have evoked different types of studies: economic policy studies such as the High Power Commission Report on ‘Transforming the Northeast’ led by SP Shukla, Member, Planning Commission (GOI, 1997); security-centric studies such as the one by the former army Lt. General R.K.Nanavatty (Nanavatty, 2013); and several academic and journalistic studies (Baruah, 2009; ­Prabhakara, 2012; Hazarika, 2009; Bhaumik, 2011; Paul, 2009). In an important work, Marcus Franke (2004) has noted that war was an essential aspect of imperial expansion in India and that the Northeast was no exception to the emergence of a ‘garrison State’ that survived Transfer of Power in 1947. A militaristic approach was followed in suppressing violent, separatist trends and tendencies in the region. State violence became the norm in response to suspected and real foreign conspiracies to destabilize the peripheral region. The Indian Army was an instrument of national integration and development in a region surrounded by Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, Myanmar and Nepal and inhabited by innumerable and complex ethnic communities. The development and security policies imposed on the region by top-heavy, over-centralized bureaucratic State apparatus have left no scope for looking back. India’s aspiration to become a major power with strategic economic, political and security concerns in Southeast Asia was constrained by lack of effort to pursue a people-centric development policy. The massive deployment of military and paramilitary forces and the use of the colonial-repressive legislation, the Armed Forces

Introduction: conflicts and the State  3

(Special Powers) Act 1958 (AFSPA), have aggravated security challenges in the region. The existence of a democratic, republican Constitution and the holding of regular elections in the country have not been seen as sufficient to meet the social justice demands. The funds allocated for such purposes are either siphoned off or misused. The development initiatives in terms of the ‘Look East’ policy, 1990 and the North East Region (NER) Vision 2020 policy have not carried conviction with the people at large. A crisis of governance has been the result. This study makes a departure in two respects from other conflict studies in the past: (i) instead of highlighting the role of the State as a monolithic and repressive entity in the Northeast, it tries to develop a specific focus on the functioning of the some of the main central institutions mentioned above; (ii) it adopts the largely neglected case study method to examine the ‘ethnic’ conflict dynamics (Zehol, 2008) in the less studied but important states of Manipur and Tripura in the region. The adoption of the case study for exploring the conflict scenario in the remaining states of Meghalaya, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim would be useful. Since 1947 conflicts have persisted in the Northeast of India, a region described as ‘densely forested mountainous uplands inhabited by tribal peoples of Tibeto-Mongoloid origin untouched by Hinduism’ (Anderson, 2012: 120). As noted, a number of official and nonofficial studies and reports exist on the nature and causes of the conflicts and the strategies and methods to be adopted to resolve them. The ‘NER Vision 2020’ document (GOI, 2008d) is among the latest official reports. The annual reports of MHA, among other things, provide details of action taken to contain separatist violence in Jammu and Kashmir; Maoist violence in central India; and sovereignty/autonomy struggles in Northeast India. The security-centric approach dominating official thinking has led to ‘conflict management’ not ‘conflict resolution’. The approach implies that non-state actors or militants should first be softened by military/paramilitary means and then be subjected to a dialogue process to bring them into the ‘national mainstream’. This study advocates a more sensitive approach.

4  Introduction: conflicts and the State

Marcus Franke (2004) in his study on Nagaland, traces the historical background of the ‘garrison State’ in British India and its significance in the Northeast. British imperial expansion in Asia was rooted in the search of ever newer revenues to finance the ‘fiscal-military State’ in Britain which had arisen from imperial rivalry with France. The military apparatus, the core of such a State, was backed by the civilian bureaucracy, which supplied it with money and manpower. The state-building process in Britain was accompanied by the economic/financial exploitation of India by the East India Company (EIC). Of the about 40,000 British people in India in the 1830s, less than 10 per cent were civilians. The Anglo-Indian Army functioned as an imperial task force. Militarist interpretations of Indian society led to military ethics and military concerns. The militarist establishment constituted the ‘garrison State’ in India (Peers, 1995: 33–39 cited in Franke). Strategic concerns and search for natural and tradable resources, markets and taxable populations brought this State to the foothills of the Himalayas in the Northeast. After Transfer of Power in 1947, every territorial-political entity in and around Assam desired independence but the Nagas were the most stubborn. However, the hills and the plains people tentatively supported the Indian National Congress. The Assamese elite wanted to remain within the Indian Union, undo the ‘divisive’ colonial administrative exclusion of the Hill regions and achieve political reunification of the Hills and the plains with a view to creating a Greater Assam reaching up to the International borders with China, Myanmar and the then East Pakistan (Franke, 2004: 219). The Indian nation-building project involved the creation of a strong and centralized State apparatus. Economic and political centralization led to the dependence of the Northeast on the central government. Centralization of power led to centralization of problems. Massive military force was used in the 1950s and 1960s to put down the Naga demand for independence. Though self-determination was accepted in theory, the territorial integrity of the State had to be safeguarded.

Introduction: conflicts and the State  5

The army was the major tool in protecting internal security in the peripheral Northeast. Military modernization was not possible since in crisis situations civil society needed army deployment (Cohen, 1990: 170). The army had a free hand in the Naga Hills. The Assam Rifles (AR) under the ‘operational control’ of the army and the AFSPA, became, as it were, the core of India’s ‘garrison State’ in the Northeast. The deployment patterns of military and central paramilitary police forces in the region today are examined briefly later in this book. Significantly, the civil police forces are outnumbered by their armed police counterpart. In successive internal expansionary moves and conflict situations in Manipur and Tripura as well as other states in the region, the British relied on the AR, ‘the oldest paramilitary force in India’. The debate on the developmental and regulatory moves of the Indian State in the Northeast today is thus fraught with considerable complexity. The strategic importance of nation-building in the context of the perceived national and international security threats in the region occupy priority attention in official thinking. With their ‘special category’ status, the states in the Northeast are financially and administratively dependent on the Government of India. Crucially, despite the existence of political democracy, the states in the region are not capable of standing up to the Centre on key economic, developmental and security matters. The ‘garrison State’ operates directly under the control of the MoD in the Government of India in order to deal with recalcitrant forces and potential external threats. The AR, the main counterinsurgency force, is directly accountable to the MoD in New Delhi and not the local governments in the region. Despite the enormous increase in their numbers during 1978–2012, the state civil and armed police forces in the region (see Table A1.9, Appendix I) are devoid of responsibility in dealing with insurgency. The AR with forty-six battalions under army control is the main counterinsurgency force protected by the immunity provisions of the AFSPA. A large number of the CAPFs are also deployed in the region, including fifty India Reserve (IR) battalions.

6  Introduction: conflicts and the State

The term ‘development’ has been used and abused in official and nonofficial discourse. ‘Development’ should be sustainable and ‘growth’ inclusive. The concept of ‘human development’ propounded by the UNDP has acquired wide currency in India with many state governments in the Northeast producing their own annual human development reports. The Government of India’s Planning Commission too produced India Human Development Report (HDR) in 2002 followed by another in 2011. The 2002 report provided useful data on violence against women but the 2011 report ignored the subject, which has acquired greater importance and urgency recently. The Manipur Human Development Report (2005) and the Tripura Human Development Report (2007) have been found useful in the present study. Unfortunately, estimates of poverty for individual states in the region do not exist and the Assam figures are used commonly by all the states. The terms ‘conflict’ and ‘violence’ are used interchangeably in this study. ‘Violence’ may be regarded as occurring to any structure when that structure is sought to be destroyed by an external agency. We argue that political violence in the Northeast arises from the very institutional structure of government (see Subramanian, 2007). Data on violence produced by the colonial-origin police and intelligence machinery are used even today by the central government’s policy institutions. The term ‘human security’ means security of people, not security of the State which is prioritized in the Indian Penal Code as ‘Offences against the State’. The term ‘human security’ as defined by the UNDP (HDR, 1994), has been used in the Tripura Human Development Report (Tripura HDR, 2007). The term ‘Governance’ may be defined as the knowledge and techniques used by or on behalf of those who govern. ‘Humane governance’ implies the shaping of policies and programmes for the benefit of those who are ruled. The terms ‘insurgency’ and ‘security forces’ are often used in a misleading way (Parratt, 2005: 132). These are loaded terms that reflect the standpoint of the rulers. The term ‘insurgent’ has implications of violence (justified or not in individual cases) as well as illegitimacy and insurrection. Roy Burman (1997: 21)

Introduction: conflicts and the State  7

noted that ‘insurgency is a cycle of reciprocal violence where the players are the state establishment and the challengers of the same’. Pakem (1997: 3) noted that leaders of militant movements do not describe themselves as ‘insurgents’ but rather as patriots, freedom fighters or defenders of their people. ‘Insurgent’ is a term applied to the insurgents by those opposed to them. This prejudges the legitimacy of their case. ‘Security forces’ are not looked upon by people as agents of their security (Parratt, 2005: 134); the military, the paramilitary and even the state police are seen by people as not contributing to their personal safety but are seen as agents of gratuitous institutional violence. The law and order approach dominating official thinking does not take note of such complexities. Their victims perceive State violence as well as non-State violence as the main problem and not ‘insurgency’ as such. Thus, the terms ‘political violence’ or conflict must include both State violence and non-State violence. State violence may also be seen as violence inflicted in the name of ‘development’ (Hussain, 2008: 25; Subramanian, 2010: 23). Under the Government of India Act, 1935, the term ‘Backward Tract’ (a derogatory term) was first used for the Naga Hills then under the direct rule of the Governor of Assam. It was changed to ‘Excluded Area’ (less derogatorily) later. By an order in 1873, the plains people were asked to obtain an ‘Inner Line Permit’ before entering the Naga Hills. Verrier Elwin, Jawaharlal Nehru’s advisor on tribal issues in the Northeast, explained that this was an effort to simultaneously protect both the tribal Hill people and the settlers in the plains. The arrangement suited the colonial power since it helped them control both Assam and the Naga Hills district. Later, the Lushai Hills too were designated an ‘Excluded Area’, meaning that the areas were ‘excluded from the competence of the Provincial and Federal Legislatures’. Elwin explained that there were two categories of ‘Excluded areas’: ‘Excluded’ and ‘Partially Excluded’. The principle of their selection was partly ‘backwardness’ but, even more, administrative convenience . . . where there was an enclave or a definite tract of country inhabited by a compact tribal population, it was classified as an ‘Excluded Area’. Where the tribal population was less homogeneous, but still undeveloped

8  Introduction: conflicts and the State

and substantial in number, the area was classified as ‘Partially Excluded’. . . The administration of the ‘Excluded Areas’ was vested in the Governors acting in their discretion and that of the ‘Partially Excluded Areas’ was vested in the control of the ministers, ‘subject, however, to the Governor exercising his individual judgment’ (Elwin, 1997, cited in Lintner, 2012: 353). After Independence, these distinctions were ignored. ‘Development’ in the sense of building infrastructure for communications and transport, taken up seriously after the Chinese incursion of 1962 and the restrictions as regards tribal areas were disregarded. The tribal communities were unaccustomed to the rapidity of change that came with ‘development’. Many scholars have called for case studies in the history and politics of individual states in the Northeast (see Lintner, 2012; Prabhakara, 2012; Choudhury, in Aggarwal, ed. 1999: 90). The histories of the insurgencies in Nagaland and Assam have been examined (Lintner, 2012; Mahanta, 2013). Case studies help in better understanding of the minds and hearts of the varied peoples of the region. Peace building can only take place on the basis of detailed case studies after interaction with the affected communities. The case studies on Manipur and Tripura in this book are an attempt to ‘look back into the future’ in the spirit of Prabhakara (2012). Manipur was forcibly integrated and Tripura voluntarily integrated in 1949. The British concept of rule of law and the use of the Indian criminal law came late in the princely states of Manipur and Tripura which had British Residents in place to advise and control the rulers. After the revolt of 1857, a new police system was established in British India but the princely states of Manipur and Tripura remained under the control of British-appointed Political Advisors. After integration, the political process moved rapidly; starting as Part C states, Manipur and Tripura went through Union Territory status and attained full statehood in 1972. Resentment in Manipur over the humiliation of prolonged ‘apprenticeship’ before statehood, contributed to insurgencies. The Manipuris noted with displeasure that the Nagas were able to attain early statehood in 1963 by resorting to violence.

Introduction: conflicts and the State  9

The fascinating history of the AR, the ‘oldest paramilitary force’ in India is explored in Chapter 4. Originally established as ‘Cachar Levy’ in 1835, it was the first organized police force in undivided Assam. Intimately linked to political developments in the region, including in the princely states of Manipur and Tripura, the AR’s role in the suppression of the ‘Second Women’s War’ (1939–40) in Manipur (Parratt, 2005: 77–89) as well as in the integration of Tripura with India are well documented (DGAR, 2010). The AR played a role in the subjugation of the Hill areas under the British. It has played a controversial role in tackling insurgencies in the Northeast in post-colonial India with many cases of human rights violations. Its ‘dual control’ by the MHA (administration and finance) and the MoD (operations) has imparted to it an ‘identity crisis’. During his personal interactions, the present writer has found the training and motivation of the AR for counterinsurgency purposes to be inadequate. In the aftermath of the 2004 rape and murder of the young Ms Thangjam Manorama Devi in Manipur allegedly by the AR personnel, a war of words ensued between the MHA and MoD over the use of the AFSPA. While Manipuri women paraded naked in front of the AR headquarters in Imphal, the two ­central ministries engaged in shadow boxing with each other. The Jeevan Reddy Committee (2005) went into the role of the AFSPA in the region and recommended its repeal. This was not acceptable to the MoD. Some felt that the setting up the Committee itself was a diversionary move. The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Ordinance, 1942 with strong impunity provisions for the armed forces, was re-enacted as a full-fledged Act in 1958 to facilitate counterinsurgency operations in the region. In 2012, the issue of human rights violations under AFSPA came up before the Supreme Court of India in a litigation by Ms Neena Ningombam, Secretary of the Extrajudicial Encounter Victim Families Association, Manipur (EEVFMAM). A three-member Committee, set up by the Court to examine the issue, came out with an indictment of the role of the security forces. This book argues that the human rights concerns in the region call for a review of India’s LEP and its NER: Vision 2020

10  Introduction: conflicts and the State

document. Development project-implementation has suffered due to corruption and leakage of funds as recently admitted by India’s Rural Development Minister himself. The gap between the people and government appears clear and gaping. The ‘the mother of all insurgencies’ in the Naga Hills had a controversial origin with military intervention suggested by BN Mullik, then chief of the Intelligence Bureau (Mullik, 1972: 295). The move had been opposed by the Governor of Assam, the army as well as the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), admits Mullik. The Naga insurgency was followed by insurgencies in Mizoram and other states. Prabhakara (2012: 253) has estimated that about thirty militant groups are active in the region, most of them ‘just names and signboards’. Some are active with a capacity for violence alternating with negotiations. They are, in varying degrees, sep­ aratists. The United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), the two factions of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN), and the United National Liberation Front (UNLF) of Manipur are the most important outfits. In Assam, Nagaland and Manipur, some ethnic militant groups fight for sovereignty. The two Naga groups make territorial claims on the neighbouring states of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Myanmar. Both State violence and violence of the non-State actors have created a serious crisis situation in the region. The five-man Justice Jeevan Reddy Committee (GOI, 2005) set up to look into the working of the AFSPA (Appendix II) in the wake of the 2004 rape and killing in Manipur of Ms Thangjam Manorama Devi noted that the Act had become ‘a symbol of oppression, an object of hate and an instrument of discrimination and highhandedness’. The omission of a woman from the Committee was glaring especially in view of the persistent violence against women by security forces in the Northeast. The report of the Committee was treated as ‘classified’. Nari Rustomji, an eminent member of the Indian Civil Service (ICS) who had spent his distinguished professional life entirely in the Northeast has stated (Rustomji, 1983: 31) that attempts to restore stability in the region, mostly based on colonial

Introduction: conflicts and the State  11

precedents, have in fact aggravated instability. The imposition of a heavy administrative control since independence has largely led to violence and that armed insurgency was accepted as the normal pattern of life. The High Level Commission report, ‘Transforming the Northeast’ (Planning Commission, GOI, 1997: 3), noted four deficits that confronted the Northeast: a basic need deficit; an infrastructure deficit; a resource deficit; and above all, ‘a two-way deficit of understanding which compounds the others’ (www. planningcommission.gov.in). The Commission, led by SP Shukla, estimated the financial and organizational resources needed to eliminate the ‘backlogs and gaps in the basic minimum services and infrastructure in the Northeast’ and to end ‘the region’s perceived sense of isolation and neglect and break the vicious cycle of stagnation and unemployment, which feeds militancy’. The Government of India’s Department for the Development of the North Eastern Region (DONER), set up in 2004, was an outcome of the Shukla Commission report. Baruah (2007: 17), who questioned the Commission’s analysis points out that its ‘neglect’ thesis was only helpful to the local elite in getting more money from the central government and indicated a ‘a convergence of self- interest’. The additional money spent to accelerate development in the Northeast would find its way to rebel groups. Closing the developmental gap is not a substitute for institution-building (see also GOI, 2008c). The World Bank, in a severe judgment, observed (2006: 13–14) that a ‘highly centralized approach with the paternalism of central-level bureaucrats, coercive top-down planning and little support or feedback from locals’ affects the development process. Distrust of centralized structures among local stakeholders makes them disbelieve that development initiatives will bring any benefit to them. The institutional arrangements are so dysfunctional that even an embankment project may be opposed by the very people it is intended to benefit. Spending large sums of money to bridge the development gap is not a substitute for a roadmap to get the Northeast out of its low-level equilibrium of poverty, non-development, civil conflict and lack of

12  Introduction: conflicts and the State

faith in political leadership. There is a lack of strong political will to ‘counteract the tendency of a society to follow the path it has already taken due to the political and financial cost of changing it’. Pradip Phanjoubam has noted that ‘development’ in the Northeast has largely meant only ‘externally delivered economic packages, which can be translated through various backdoor means and leakages at the soonest possible time into hard cash’ (Phanjoubam in Baruah, ed. 2009: 147–67). He adds that ‘development’ in the Northeast is shaped by the ‘perceived imperatives of conflict management’. Jairam Ramesh the then Union Rural Development minister is cited (Baruah, 2007: 38–9) to the effect that the annual expenditure of the Government of India in the Northeast (including Sikkim) is about Rs 300 million; this works out to about Rs 10,000 per person in the region. The money is not going for development but to ensure cohesion with the rest of the country but leaks out through a series of interlocutors including ‘politicians, expatriate contractors, extortionists, anybody but those working to deliver benefits to the people for whom these expenditures are intended’. The intended beneficiaries in the region would benefit if bank accounts could be opened for them and an annual sum of Rs 10,000 deposited for every poor family! The fact remains that the political and electoral leverages of the Members of Parliament (MPs) elected from the region are limited because of their smaller number (twenty-four members of the Lok Sabha and thirteen of the Rajya Sabha in a House of 543 members; see Appendix I, Table A1.2). A pervasive sense of crisis, alienation, loss of identity and backwardness exists on the part of tribal and non-tribal communities alike. However, politics in the Northeast is not to be understood today only in terms of ‘ethnicity’ and ‘identity’ but relates to practical issues in ‘development’ (Hussain, 2008) such as popular resistance to the ‘brutality of development-induced displacement’ arising from the construction of 168 mega dams combined and poor policies of rehabilitation and resettlement

Introduction: conflicts and the State  13

of the project-affected. The popular protest over dams under construction at Subansiri (Arunachal Pradesh), Tipaimukh (Manipur) and Pagladia (Assam) are indicative of the process. As noted, the ‘special category’ status of the states of the Northeast makes them dependent on the central government for financial assistance on the concessional basis of 90 per cent grants and 10 per cent loans. Most of the states were created in 1972 without examining whether they had adequate revenue resources to meet administrative and other non-developmental expenditure (Sachdeva, 2000: 60–61). A corrupt form of electoral democracy largely benefiting the politicians, middlemen and corrupt bureaucrats has been brought into existence in the several states of the region without much accountability to the local people. While the MHA in New Delhi is the nodal agency for the Northeast, the MoD at the Centre too plays a crucial role. Data on army deployment in the Northeast is provided in Chapter 5. Further, the nearly fourfold increase during 1978–2012 in the number of civilian and armed police forces deployed in the several states of the region is noteworthy (Appendix I, Table A1.9). Finally, it may be clarified that the term ‘State’ used in this study means the political power of the governmental machinery. The term ‘state’ with a small ‘s’ means the administrative, territorial entity of individual states such as Manipur or Tripura. Chapter 1 explores the policy process in the Government of India with regard to the conflict scenario in the Northeast from 1947 to the present. It looks briefly at the impact of the Look East Policy (LEP) 1991 and the NER: Vision 2020 policy 2008. Chapters 2 and 3, adopt the case study method to explore the distinctive features of ethnic conflict dynamics and State response during colonial and postcolonial periods in the former princely states of Manipur and Tripura. In 1891 Manipur had witnessed a traumatic conflict with the British, ending its existence as an independent polity and establishing colonial domination. The controversial circumstances of its integration into India in 1949 led to the emergence of multiple insurgencies in the valley region of Manipur. The insurgency in the Naga-dominated Hill areas of the state had a different origin in the demand

14  Introduction: conflicts and the State

for independence in the neighbouring Naga areas of the then unified Assam province. The Naga-Meitei ethnic conflict and the Kuki, Hmar and other ethnic conflicts have added to the extreme complexity of the conflict dynamics and State response in Manipur. The imposition of the AFSPA in September 1980 and the militarization of State policy that followed, have led to an unprecedented crisis of governance in the state. The chapter also examines the specific and important role of the AFSPA in Manipur, which has given rise to the unprecedented protest fast of Ms Irom Sharmila starting from November 2000 and continuing till today. The AFSPA is dealt with at greater length in Chapter 4. Chapter 3 explores the historical and contemporary background of the conflict dynamics and State response in Tripura, which witnessed a major tribal-nontribal dichotomy and confrontation. Following Partition, the huge influx of a predominantly Hindu population from neighbouring Bangladesh across the porous borders into Tripura converted the mainly indigenous tribal state into a predominantly non-tribal state. Unlike Manipur, there was no popular opposition in Tripura to the process of integration with India in 1949. The insurgency in the state originated from tribal resistance to loss of land to the immigrant Bengali non-tribal people. The Communist Party of India (CPI) played a seminal role in spearheading tribal militancy. A three-way political contestation between the tribal ethnic leadership, the communists and the Congress party shaped the dynamics of the conflict situation and the response of the State in Tripura. The tribal-nontribal conflict in the state has been subdued today but the state government finds it still necessary to retain the operation of the AFSPA in a majority of the police stations in the tribal areas of the state and continue deployment of the AR under the army and the CAPFs. Chapter 4 examines the historical background and role of the AR and the AFSPA in the Northeast and brings out their incompatibility with the current State policy of peace building in terms of the LEP, 1991 and the NER: Vision 2020. Peace building in the region requires (i) repeal of the draconian AFSPA; (ii)

Introduction: conflicts and the State  15

reconsideration of the role of the AR; and (iii) reversal of the militarization of the region, which has caused immense hardship to the people especially its women and children. Expert opinion rejects the constitutionality and necessity of the AFSPA. The need for the AR is negated by the existence of huge numbers of CAPFs and a massive increase in the numbers of state police (including armed police) forces in the region between 1978 and 2012. The chapter draws attention to the recommendations of the National Police Commission (NPC, 1981) on policing the Northeast by the composite force of the AR, the CRPF and the state police forces under the control of the local governments. Chapter 5 briefly expounds the basically colonial-repressive character of the police and the major intelligence agency inherited from India’s past, which remains still unreformed. These elements hinder peace building of any real significance. This is followed by an account of the current official evaluation of the conflict scenario in states of Manipur, Tripura, Nagaland and Assam in that order. More detailed evaluations of the conflict scenario in these states are then provided on the basis of published academic accounts and other reports. The present levels of deployment of the army and central paramilitary forces are discussed and attention drawn to the nearly fourfold increase in the number state police forces in the region during the period from 1978 to 2012. The multiple special security laws used in the region since independence are noted. The attempted conflict resolution experience of the Concerned Citizens Committee (CCC) in the South Indian state of Andhra Pradesh in the context of the Maoist conflict in the state is then reported as a possible template for civil society initiatives in the conflict-affected states of the Northeast. The rapid political change has promoted identity-based conflicts in the region leading to segmentation and fragmentation of the social fabric. Willingness to recognize and accept plurality and complexity are essential to prevent further deterioration of the situation. The chapter concludes with an examination of the international experience in the area of conflict resolution and offers recommendations for policy action in the region.

Chapter 1

Conflicts in the Northeast The policy process

When the British departed India in 1947 they left behind no major institutional agency for providing information for policy analysis on conflicts in the country other than the Intelligence Bureau (IB). The agency existed from 1887 but was formalized as the IB only in 1920. The IB, a top secret police organization with no legal framework or charter of duties framed after independence, has been providing basic information on conflict scenarios in different parts of the country to the present Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in New Delhi. B.N. Mullik, as the Director of the IB (1950–64), was close to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and played a key role in policy making with regard to important issues such as the arrest and detention of Sheikh Abdullah in Kashmir (1953); the induction of the army into the Naga Hills of Assam (1955); the ‘forward policy’ on China (1959); and the dismissal of the communist ministry and imposition of President’s rule in Kerala (1959). The prime minister, busy as he was with many matters of foreign policy, relied heavily on his intelligence chief Mullik in formulating his response to internal security emergencies (see Subramanian, 2007: 81–105). It was in 1967, when the ‘Naxalite’ (later Maoist) movement emerged, that the Research and Policy (R&P) Division came up in MHA to explore informed policy options with respect to conflict situations in different parts of the country. In 1969, the Division produced its first major report on the then ‘Naxalite’ (later Maoist), movement placing it firmly in the context of

Conflicts in the Northeast  17

agrarian tensions, their causes and trends. The report warned that the ‘Green Revolution’, then underway, could turn into a ‘red revolution’ if appropriate agrarian reform measures were not undertaken. The report was discussed in Parliament. The then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi urged state governments to institute land-reform measures. However, the parallel existence of two different institutions, IB and the R&P Division of the MHA, reporting on the same subjects and often differing from each other, presented a situation of conflict of interest, which led to the eventual winding up of the latter in preference to the former. The lack of institutionalization of appropriate policy mechanisms for conflict analysis and action paralysed the ministry leading to its total dependence on the IB, a top secret police outfit, for understanding and trying to resolve basic conflict issues. The situation came to such a pass that in 2006 a fairly alarmed MHA found itself relying on the IB’s view of the Maoist violence as the country’s ‘biggest internal security threat’ ignoring the Planning Commission’s Expert Group’s scholarly and comprehensive report on Development Challenges in Extremist-affected Areas (GOI, 2008) which offered a developmental analysis and recommendations avoiding the law and order approach to the Maoist phenomenon. This led the MHA to resort to the massive deployment of central paramilitary forces in the Maoist areas with deleterious consequences to the tribal population living in the areas. While studying the government response to violence in the Northeast today, one must go back to 1955 and examine the decision to induct the army into the Naga Hills area of the undivided Assam province. The decision was provoked by the agitation by a section of the Naga people who demanded independence of Nagaland from India. Nari Rustomji (1983: 22–33), who held high office in the Northeast during the early post-independence years, provides perhaps the most perceptive account of the paradox of a Mahatma Gandhi-inspired nationalist government resorting to heavy military means to suppress the tiny Naga resistance at appalling human cost to ordinary Nagas.

18  Conflicts in the Northeast

The controversial decision in 1955, overruling the reservations of the then Governor of Assam, the army and the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), to induct the army into Nagaland to suppress the Naga rebellion, was taken by Prime Minister Nehru at the instance of the powerful Director of the IB, B. N. Mullik. The resulting Naga insurgency became the ‘mother of all insurgencies’ in the Northeast. T.C.A. Srinivasavaradan, a former Home Secretary, has perceptively noted the deficiencies in policy making in the MHA with reference to Naxalite/Maoist violence in the country: The available expertise at the bureaucratic level to understand, anticipate and evaluate an intricate problem was inadequate and amateurish. The situation in some cases was salvaged in the past because of the flexibility of the system, the sagacity of the political leadership and its openness to information from all quarters. The political response to Naxalite/Maoist violence had been based on a proper perception of socioeconomic conditions. After the intensity of the violence had abated, however, recourse was taken to the standard recipe of deployment of central paramilitary forces ignoring allegations of fake encounters, illegal arrests, and other similar misdeeds. . . In dealing with problems of societal transition, excessive preoccupation with peace and order, ignoring issues of law and justice, can prove expensive in the long run . . . Lack of steadfastness of purpose is not desirable in dealing with basic nation-building tasks (Srinivasavaradan, 1992: 32). The general policy scenario in the government of India with regard to conflicts in the Northeast has thus been largely messy contrary to formal professions of peaceful intent. The institutional mechanisms in the government of India which tend largely to rely on colonial precedents would require drastic reform. The police machinery, a crucial part of the current policy structure, has recently been described as a ‘dangerous anachronism’ (HRW, 2009). The amateurishness and ad hoc nature of

Conflicts in the Northeast  19

policy professionals and the absence of inter-disciplinary inputs of knowledge, skill, vision and expertise at the top have vitiated the policy process. Disaggregated policy-relevant and empathetic people-centric case studies on conflict evolution in each state of the Northeast is a prime necessity and the tendency to lump all states together and suggest policy measures must be avoided at all costs. MHA and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) are jointly responsible for dealing with conflict situations in the Northeast, which has sensitive international borders. The Ministry for the Development of the North Eastern Region (DONER) set up in 2004 and the existing mechanism of the North Eastern Council (NEC) are concerned with development issues though not without the NEC having some exiguous responsibility for security management in the region. MHA’s lack of transparency and complex relations with IB, and the Defence Ministry, are problem areas that need attention. Further, the continued reliance on the controversial Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 (AFSPA) for so-called conflict management in the region, ignoring the legitimate role of the state police forces, complicates the matter. The Northeast is cradled by five Asian countries, China, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, and Bangladesh. The region’s difficulties and socioeconomic backwardness arising from the loss of connectivity with the rest of India after Partition are well known (Mukherjee, 2007). The far-reaching Look East Policy (LEP) of the Government of India, which combines foreign policy, trade, defence, security and strategic dimensions, was announced in 1991. But it was only in 2008 that the Northeast appeared in a related policy formulation in the shape of an NER: Vision 2020 document (GOI, 2008d). The voluminous document produced by the Ministry of DONER and NEC has no Index to help a hardworking author. Further, among the six authors and six research associates who produced the document, only one was from the Northeast (Chakraborty, 2012: 33). Therefore, when the document was released in New Delhi, people in the Northeast were reportedly indifferent. The

20  Conflicts in the Northeast

first two volumes of the document contain general and sectoral strategies, respectively, for the development of the Northeast. The third volume contains Appendices. Of interest is Chapter 14 in the second volume on ‘Governance and Security’. Based on the market-oriented development paradigm, the chapter prioritises ‘proper law and order’ so that any transaction can be carried out in the market without fear of coercion. The Northeast as a whole, minus Sikkim has been convulsed by different types of conflicts between the State and armed groups and popular movements fighting for a range of demands such as outright secession to greater autonomy within the Indian Constitution. Active negotiations are going on to settle the Naga insurgency while ceasefire exists with regard to conflicts in Meghalaya, Assam, Manipur and Tripura. A peace accord was signed in Mizoram in 1986. Though no less than 40 insurgent groups are said to function in seven states, only a clutch of them are reportedly capable of causing substantial violence. About 15 groups have been banned by the Centre. Though large parts of the region are now claimed by official agencies to be free of insurgency, confrontations are caused because of poor governance, high levels of corruption and political instability. Many of the groups are extortionist and run money-making rackets and illegal enterprises. Significantly, Assam, Manipur, Tripura and Nagaland have higher number of policemen per unit of population than the national average (Padmanabhiah, cited in GOI, 2008c: 155). A significant feature of NER: Vision 2020 document is its complete omission, ignoring the public feeling in the region, of any discussion on the impact of the controversial AFSPA on the lives of ordinary people, especially women and children. Another issue neglected in the Vision document is the role of the Assam Rifles (AR), a central paramilitary force, whose functioning is linked to the existence of AFSPA. AR is a special police force created by the British in 1835 to provide security to British establishments in Assam. Subsequent to the creation of several new states in the region in 1972 and the consequent raising of new police forces by them, besides the deployment of

Conflicts in the Northeast  21

other central armed police forces (CAPFs) such as the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and the India Reserve Battalions (IRB), the AR has been made historically anomalous. The counter-insurgency role that AR has been performing controversially on behalf of the central government symbolized by the MHA and the MoD, is best left to state police forces. AR should be confined to guarding the Indo–Myanmar border. Taking advantage of the immunity from prosecution provided by AFSPA, AR has been guilty of serious human rights violations in the region. There has been nearly a fourfold increase in the police forces available with states in the region between 1978 and 2011 (see Appendix I, Table A1.9). Since law and order is a state subject under the Constitution, it would be proper if these forces are trained to discharge counter-insurgency duties, which are now performed by the AR in a fairly unaccountable manner, given its lack of accountability to the local governments. If steps are taken to enforce accountability of state governments for dealing with insurgency, the existence of the AR and the controversial AFSPA would become redundant. It will also help avoid human rights violations in the region and bring an end to the 15-yearlong historic fast against AFSPA undertaken by the indomitable Ms Irom Sharmila in Manipur. The Vision 2020 document lists out the following steps taken to ensure peace, security and human rights in the region: (i) ceasefire agreement with the Isak Muivah Group of National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) from 1 August 1998; (ii) suspension of operations against the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) from 1 June 2005; (iii) conclusion of agreement with Dima Halam Deogah (DHD) on 1 January 2003 and with Achik National Volunteer Council (ANVC) on 23 July 2004; and (iv) increase in the number of IRB deployed in the region to 51. This is in addition to state civil armed police (including district armed police) and central paramilitary forces (CPFs) inducted in each state on an ad hoc basis. The Vision document has implications for not only trade and commerce (Chakraborty, 2012: 1) but emphasizes other

22  Conflicts in the Northeast

issues such as self-governance and participatory development; creation of development opportunities; emphasis on sectors with comparative advantage; capacity building of people and institutions; creation of hospitable climate for investment; and infrastructure development through public investment. The 600-page document also stresses increasing connectivity and employment opportunities through State investment; encouraging private investment in natural resource harnessing, agriculture and tourism. Chakraborty (Ibid.: 1) notes that the Look East Policy is ‘seamlessly entwined’ with India’s foreign policy aspirations, strategic initiatives, economic cooperation, and security considerations. However, civil society in the Northeast is divided between the State agenda of ‘counter-insurgency from above’ and ‘ethno-nationalist politics of identity from below’ (Ibid.: 33). It has been observed that big development in the Northeast is always associated with resource extraction by an external authority, usually the State. This leads to dissent and suspicion among the people. The effort to harness the hydro-electric potential of the region by building big dams has led to conflicts not only between the Indian state and the people but also between different states such as Arunachal Pradesh and Assam. The cases of resistance between the people and the state and between different agencies within the state to uranium extraction from Meghalaya and oil extraction from Rohomoria in Dibrugarh district of Assam are relevant here. Further, issues of land acquisition and displacement are caused while undertaking development programmes. It has further been observed that since capitalist relations in India are not dominant, resource means people’s resource; the ownership of the State is not absolute. Significantly, the Vision 2020 document makes no mention of the much-debated AFSPA which has been operating in the Northeast for long. Considerable research is available on the impact of this so-called law on the Northeast (see Chapter 2 for the role of the AFSPA in Manipur and chapter for a broader discussion of the ‘law’).

Conflicts in the Northeast  23

The Vision 2020 document admits that contestation in the Northeast has taken multiple forms: (i) armed opposition to the Indian state, (ii) violence against migrants, (iii) movements for separate federal states and autonomous units, (iv) demand for more funds from the central government, and (v) politically generated inter-ethnic conflicts, among others. Further, the report on ‘Capacity Building for Conflict Resolution: From Friction to Fusion’ (GOI, 2008c) produced by the Second Administrative Reforms Commission (SARC) traces conflicts in Northeast to the multiple ethnicities operating in the region. Mechanisms for conflict resolution are provided by the Constitution of India at different levels of governance but conflicts have persisted and grown in the region giving rise to serious capacity building challenges (143–79). Central police forces may need to be used though only on a minimal scale given the feelings of alienation persisting in the region (GOI, 2008c: 150). Civil society organizations too have a role to play. The institutions of ‘development’ (not defined) that exist and increase in plan allocations are viewed as sufficient to minimize ethnic conflicts. Earmarking of 10 per cent of the development expenditure of all ministries and departments of the Union government for the Northeast is appreciated. The report notes that the fruits of development may not have percolated to the beneficiaries owing to ‘lack of local absorptive capacity and inappropriate development strategies’ or due to ‘corruption and diversion of funds, often to the coffers of the insurgents’. The other such processes relate to siphoning off of food grains from public distribution system to benefit the militants; extortion rackets; protection money payments etc. leading to ‘stable anarchy’ subverting rule of law and democratic governance (GOI, 2008c: 151). Greater devolution and participation in the Northeast are noted as having met local aspirations. Political interventions cannot admit of ‘further radical innovations’ (Ibid.: 151) and there is need for better utilization of existing instrumentalities for growth. The report cites the Padmanabhiah Committee (GOI, 2008c: 155) to the effect that policemen per hundred square

24  Conflicts in the Northeast

kilometres of area are higher in the Northeast as compared to the all-India average given thin population and difficult terrain. About 42 policemen per hundred square kilometres of area exist in India as a whole but the figure for Tripura is 117; Nagaland 91; and Manipur 63. Further, against the all-India figure of about 136 policemen per lakh of population, Nagaland has 950 policemen; Mizoram 752; Manipur 593; and Tripura 341 (see Appendix I, Table A1.9 of this book for overall figures). It is not clear if the Padmanabhiah Committee included in its estimate the large numbers of central police forces located in the region: the annual report of the MHA (2010–11) reports a total of 51 IRB (about 51,000 armed men) deployed in the region with state-specific quotas; additionally 46 battalions (46,000 men) of AR are deployed along with other CAPFs on a semi-permanent basis. Manipur with a population of less than three million, for example, witnessed the deployment of about 60 battalions of central and state paramilitary forces in November 2009 (DSG, 2009). The SARC report views the NEC set up in 1972 as a ‘supra state’ institution with a Security Advisor from the AR (later replaced by MHA official). The Council finances regional development schemes. The amended NEC Act provides that the Council has a role in conflict management and review of security and public order situation. The NEC reports directly to the MHA on this issue since DONER, its administrative ministry, is not provided any role in this area (Ibid.: 167). The DONER was earlier part of the MHA but became a full-fledged ministry in 2004 on the recommendation of the High Level Commission (GOI, 1997) led by SP Shukla. The MHA however, retains ‘nodal responsibility’ for the region and the DONER merely supervises the development work of the NEC. The concurrent existence of the several central agencies with similar functions in dealing with the region becomes a potential source of confusion. The existence of the DONER conflicts with the role of the subject matter ministries. The division of duties between the MHA and DONER, as noted by the SARC report, affects the growth of the region. Meaningful

Conflicts in the Northeast  25

monitoring of development can only occur at the NEC headquarters in Shillong and not in New Delhi where the DONER is located. Therefore, the report recommends abolition of the DONER and restoration of the responsibility of subject matter ministries for infrastructure development and utilization of non-lapsable funds. The MHA would continue to be the ‘nodal’ ministry for security with the restoration of the NEC’s original coordinative ‘conflict resolution role’. It may, however, be noted (Jitendra, The Statesman, 24 February 2013) that the budget grants to the NEC are being reduced on account of non-utilization of previously allotted grants (see also Rajkumar, 2011, chapter 10). Significantly, the SARC report fails to define ‘development’, a concept about which there is no universally agreed common understanding. Nor does it talk about concepts such as ‘sustainable development’ and ‘inclusive growth’, which are common currency in the development discourse. It does not conceive that often ‘State-centric development’ could lead to conflicts as noted in many studies on the Northeast (Hussain, 2008). The UNDP’s concept of human development is also ignored and the fact that several states in the Northeast have gone ahead to bring out their own annual Human Development Reports is neglected. The SARC report calls for a study on the genesis of conflicts and the institutional and administrative interventions needed. It notes rightly that conflicts are not a law and order problem and that fault lines run along identities of tribe, caste, region and religion. The State has the duty to create institutions and political conditions to mediate and integrate conflicts to enable groups to function normally. While observing that ‘conflicts indicate deep-seated grievances over unequal sharing of benefits from development’, the report fails to note that official conflict mitigation exercises take place in New Delhi largely on the basis of classified information from colonial-origin law and order agencies manned by police officers with a security mind set. The MoD too plays a largely negative role. The report does not explain why the AR, a counterinsurgency force, continues under the ‘dual control’ of the MHA and the MoD creating

26  Conflicts in the Northeast

confusion and diluted accountability to the governments in the region. Chapter 14 in volume II of the Vision 2020 document (289–94) discussed earlier prioritises ‘proper maintenance of law and order’. It provides law and order statistics in Table 14.1A. Another Table 14.2A provides data on policemen per every hundred square kilometres in the region (see Tables in Appendix I, especially Table A1.9). However, as noted earlier, the Padmanabhiah Committee had adversely mentioned the excessive concentration of police and security forces in the small and thinly populated states of the Northeast as compared to national averages. The Vision document approves the steps taken for ‘peace and human rights’ such as: (i) ceasefire agreement with the IsakMuivah Group of the NSCN from 1 August 1998; (ii) ceasefire agreement with the NSCN (K) group on 28 April 2004; (iii) suspension of operations with the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) from 1 June 2005; and (iv) agreement with the Dima Halam Daogah (DHD) on 1 January 2003. Conspicuously missing though are reports on the progress, if any, in talks with the ULFA and other outfits in Assam; the situation in the disturbed Bodoland Autonomous Territorial Area District (BTAD); and the grave security scenario in Manipur. Nor is there any mention of the role of the AFSPA, the AR and the other CAPFs. The number of IRB in the region has risen to 51 (GOI, 2010–11; see Appendix I, Table A1.9 for state-wise break up). Fourty-six battalions of the AR are also in place in the region, in addition to civil police and armed police battalions created by the state governments in the Northeast after 1972 (see the comparative statement in Appendix I, Table A1.9). These are further supplemented by the frequent induction of CAPFs, which are distinct from the AR described as the ‘oldest central paramilitary force’ in India. The Vision document makes no mention of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 (AFSPA), or the AR and CAPFs deployed in the region. Thus the many deficiencies in the SARC

Conflicts in the Northeast  27

report and the NER: Vision 2020 document thus limits their usefulness in understanding conflict dynamics in the Northeast. Since 1990s, several international human rights organizations, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR), have protested against the serious violation of human rights by the security forces under the AFSPA (Chenoy 2002). However, AFSPA is only one of the many laws that act against human rights. The impact of State violence and counterviolence from armed opposition groups on women has been serious. Women are routinely questioned and exposed to sexual harassment. In armed conflict situations, several categories of women are affected: women relatives of armed activists, women relatives of State armed forces, women militants or combatants, women as shelter providers, women as victims of sexual and physical abuse, and women as peace negotiators and activists. In militarized societies, even in locations where actual armed conflict is minimal, violence against women is far higher than in non-militarized societies. Race and gender intersect violence and harassment directed at women, especially by non-tribal members of the armed forces (Srikala and Goswami, 2005). Obviously in all these cases women include children as well when it comes to harassment and ill-treatment (see Subramanian, 2007: 170–91; Subramanian and Verma, 2009: 119–36). The government of India’s policy structure for the Northeast must thus be judged counterproductive. The turf warfare between the MHA and MoD on the issues of the AFSPA and the ‘dual control’ of the AR causes confusion. The recommendation of the SARC report (GOI: 2008c) that DONER be abolished and additional teeth provided to the NEC has so far been ignored. Apart from the confusion between the MHA and MoD on key issues noted here, there are further contradictions between the NEC and Planning Commission and DONER; the 1997 High-Level Shukla Commission recommendations and those of the SARC, 2008; the respective roles of the DONER and NEC and role of other developmental ministries; the AR and CAPFs; the AR and the state police forces; and finally, the overall development objectives and regulatory approaches.

28  Conflicts in the Northeast

The states in the Northeast function on central government financial support on the basis of 90 per cent grant and 10 per cent local resources. The competition for central resources may often hinder the state governments from cooperating with each other on issues of common interest. Finally, in 1947 the princely states of Manipur and Tripura remained separated, and were later integrated into India in 1949. The rest of the region constituted the state of Assam. In 1954, the North East Frontier Agency (NEFA) was created in what is now Arunachal Pradesh, the northern border of which is contested by China. The state of Meghalaya was carved out of Assam by the North-Eastern Areas (Reorganization) Act, 1971. The Act also transformed Manipur and Tripura from Union Territories to full-fledged states. The Nagaland state had been carved out of Assam by the State of Nagaland Act, 1962 and Mizoram state by the State of Mizoram Act, 1986. The state of Arunachal Pradesh was created by the State of Arunachal Pradesh Act, 1986. During the colonial period, the British had declared some interior tribal areas in the region ‘restricted’ or ‘partially restricted’ areas in order to protect their less advanced and ‘pre-modern’ tribal populations from intrusion by more advanced and exploitative elements of the Indian ‘mainstream’. The princely states of Manipur and Tripura did not have the administrative and political arrangements set up in the rest of the country during the colonial era. These came into existence in these states only after their incorporation into India. The states of Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh, once part of the Assam province, are tribal majority states, although increasingly subject to non-tribal immigration from outside, which is one of the factors leading to conflicts. Assam, the largest state in the Northeast with a non-tribal majority, has also a significant number of different tribal communities living there. Recent conflicts in the Bodoland Tribal Autonomous District (BTAD) areas are an example of the kind of ethnic conflicts that could occur. All the specificities of each state need to be taken into account in conducting research and policy analysis by official agencies in order to formulate appropriate recommendations in a balanced manner.

Chapter 2

A Manipur case study

This chapter explores the distinctive features of ethnic conflict dynamics in the former princely state of Manipur. The state had already witnessed a traumatic conflict with the British in 1891. After independence, the less than voluntary circumstances of the state’s merger with India in 1949 led to the emergence of many an insurgency in the Valley. The insurgency in the Naga-dominated Hill areas of the state however, arose from the Naga demand for independence in the neighbouring Naga Hills of the undivided province of Assam. The Naga–Meitei conflict and other ethnic conflicts involving the Kuki, the Hmar, and other communities, which followed, added to the complexity of the conflict dynamics in the state. The imposition of the AFSPA in September 1980 and the militarization of the state which followed, have led to an unprecedented crisis of governance in Manipur, from which it is still to recover. The use of special laws, the Assam Rifles (AR) and Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) etc. deal with persistent political conflicts stemming from popular discontent has been a persistent feature in the state. Some of the popular demands of the Manipuris were met in a grudging manner but no basic changes in the understanding and approach on the part of the central government to the challenges of governance in the state, have been forthcoming. Manipur, a former princely state with a rich history of unbroken continuity, has a land area of 22,327 square kilometres (sq. km), most of it in the Hills and the rest in the Valley below, of alluvial soil with about 60 per cent of the population of about

30  A Manipur case study

2.7 million (2011 Census) concentrated there. The state is a complex mix of multiple ethnicities, faiths and languages. With no effective rail transport system and inter-state communications, the Valley depends mainly on the national highway, which is vulnerable to blockades by political agitators. Scant availability of power and telecommunications inhibits utilization of the potential for growth. With an international border of about 352 km along Myanmar, the state is surrounded by Nagaland, Assam and Mizoram. The state capital Imphal is situated about 500 km from Guwahati, the regional capital. The existing railhead in the west in Jiribam has a bad road connection to Imphal, potentially the commercial destination for trade with neighbouring Southeast Asian countries. With perhaps the largest number of insurgent groups in the country, the human security crisis in Manipur impacts industrialization and employment generation for the growing population of talented, educated youth. The state’s 12th Five Year Plan (2012–17) notes the lack of development of agriculture and allied activities, foreign trade, information technology, food, and other areas of education. The state assembly elections duly took place in 2012 but elections to local bodies and tribal autonomous district councils were delayed. The state has nine revenue districts and four zilla parishads in the Valley and six autonomous district councils (not under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution) for the tribal communities in the Hills. There are thirty-eight administrative subdivisions, sixty development blocks, fifty-one towns, sixty-four police stations/outposts, 166 gram panchayats, and 2,588 inhabited villages. The fertile Manipur Valley is home to the Meiteis who comprise about two thirds of the population. The Hills comprise about 90 per cent of the land area with about thirty ethnic groups, loosely termed ‘Naga’ and ‘Kuki’. A minority (about 11 per cent) of Meitei Muslims are in the Valley. Regional migration is a persistent feature. The political entity of Manipur has long been a single unit embracing the Hills and the Valley. The conflicts which characterize these two parts of the state today did not exist in the

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past. Historically, the state was part of the states to the east of India, which must be contextualized to place recent developments in perspective (Parratt, 2005: 1). Focus on the Meitei perspective rather than a pan-Manipuri approach has often ignored the tribespeople of the Hills, who became literate only after the advent of Christianity in the late-nineteenth century. The comparative neglect of tribal voices tends to aggravate antagonisms between the Hills and the Valley. The history of Manipur before and after its integration with India in 1949 has been a history of conflicts, unrest, spectacular human rights violations, and equally spectacular resistance. The picture in Manipur in this sense contrasts sharply with Tripura, the other conflict-affected state studied in the next chapter.

Anti-imperialist war, 1891 and after British rule in princely Manipur was established after the Manipuri royalist forces were defeated in their fight against imperialism in 1891 (Parratt and Parratt, 1997). A minor with no claim to the throne was appointed king and the British ruled the state for two decades. The emergence of modernity in the state can be traced to 1921 when Prince Chura Chand was appointed by the British to the throne. The history of Manipur is marked by recurrent oppression and resistance. While British colonial rule meant external oppression, the internal oppression came from the feudal kingly regime. Colonial control led to violent protest in the Hills. The internal feudal control led to conflict between the king, the new elites, and popular grassroots movements. Religion was an important factor in the struggle for a new identity. The Meiteis’ adoption of Vaishnavism in the eighteenth century was followed by the adoption of Christianity by the Hill tribes in the twentieth century. An influential section of the Meiteis, however, saw Vaishnavism as oppressive and sought to revive their own ancient religion of Sanamahi, free of the Hindu caste oppression. At the end of the Second World War, Manipur regained its political autonomy, which was lost again in 1949 when integration with India was forcibly carried out. Militant movements

32  A Manipur case study

emerged in protest. Elite exploitation of the land and the people continued. The division between the Hills and the Valley arose from religious differences coupled with colonial policies. This background must be kept in view in understanding the dynamics of conflicts and State’s response in Manipur. With the lapse of British paramountcy in 1947, the state reverted to its pre-1891 autonomy and became one of the first states in India to have free elections with adult franchise, a constitutional monarchy and an elected legislature. In 1948, following the establishment of an interim government, a constitutional monarchy came into existence. An elected assembly and ministry took office in September 1948. However, independent India in October 1949 ignored the constitutionally elected government and forcibly took over the state. The process is well-documented by the then Advisor to the Governor of Assam (Rustomji, 1973: 109). The events during the merger became a source of political tensions and conflict. The ‘insurgency’ in Manipur was a political response to forcible integration with India. While India’s Independence Act 1947 (para 7b) stated that the suzerainty of the British over the state had lapsed along with all treaties and agreements, the Manipuri leaders took it that the end of the Raj meant Manipur’s independence and freedom to negotiate with new India. Three important documents namely, (i) the written memoranda between the Governor of Assam and the Maharaja dated 1–2 July 1947; (ii) the instrument of Accession signed on 11 August 1947; and (iii) the merger agreement signed on 21 September 1949 assured the autonomy and independence of Manipur in dealing with independent India (Parratt, 2005: 109–20). Constitution-making in Manipur was completed in July 1947. And it provided for a legislature based on adult franchise with constitutional monarchy. The state elections in 1948 were contested by several parties and the Praja Shanti party formed a government with Maharaj Kumar Priyabroto Singh as chief minister. However, on 15 October, the Manipur state assembly was forcibly dissolved by the Government of India and a Chief Commissioner was appointed. Manipur was categorized as a Part C state of the Indian Union. A Territorial Assembly

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was set up in 1963 with no effective powers. After prolonged agitation, Manipur was allowed full statehood in 1972 and state assembly elections were held the same year. The complex history of the absorption of Manipur into India explains the continuing popular suspicion and resentment felt by Manipuris over moves and motives of the Government of India. The proliferation of insurgency movements in Manipur fighting for political autonomy and even complete independence must be placed in this context (Parratt and Parratt, 2003: 99–109). These movements have led to successive central governments imposing draconian measures including the declaration of the whole of Manipur as a ‘Disturbed Area’ to enable the imposition of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 (AFSPA), which, in many respects, violates international humanitarian law as well as the provisions of the Constitution of India. It provoked the historic indefinite hunger strike by Ms Irom Sharmila which has lasted from November 2000 to the present. Bizarrely, Sharmila has been kept under arrest for attempted suicide and is officially force-fed through the nose. Though the judiciary recently set her free on grounds of freedom of expression, she was rearrested after release perhaps under military pressure. It is not clear why the Indian military is so scared of a lone woman on protest fast. However, the military and paramilitary presence in Manipur is massive (Delhi Solidarity Group, DSG, 2009). Extra-judicial killings of suspected militants and civilians, rape, beatings and torture of women by security forces have been frequent. The fragmented politics of Manipur must be traced back to the events after political integration with India. The Manipur Congress, defeated in the 1948 elections, was pro-integration since it perceived it as an opportunity to grab political power. Most other parties were in favour of complete independence or autonomy within India. The Manipur Congress, however, dominated politics till 1972. When the first proper elections were held in 1972, it was seen as having been responsible for two decades of misrule and for central government neglect.

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Political instability became endemic in the state. No party was able to form a government by itself and the dominant party formed a coalition with smaller parties and independents from the Hills. Defections and the activity of pro- and anti-Delhi factions complicated matters. Political instability led to the frequent imposition of President’s rule. Various identities played significant roles in political alignments. The assertion of Naga separatism in the Naga dominated Hill districts led to re-emphasis of a common Manipuri identity cutting across ethnicity. The 2001 extension of the Naga Ceasefire Agreement ‘without territorial limits to all Naga-inhabited areas’ led to massive protests and precipitated Meitei violence on a large scale. On 24 July 2001, the central government interlocutor met the Naga separatist leader T. Muivah at Bangkok and announced the removal of the offending phrase ‘without territorial limits’ from the text of the ceasefire agreement. The events surrounding the Naga ceasefire agreement, far from being just another violent episode in Manipur’s history of violence, impacted the course of the state assembly elections in 2002. Simmering issues came to the surface of politics: the unproductive politics of changing coalitions and defections; the self-seeking of aggressive politicians; the territorial integrity of the state; the harmony of an ethnically and religiously divided society; and above all, the need to protect and preserve the human rights of ordinary people threatened by insurgent violence and State violence. The election results threw up a coalition government by a ‘Secular Progressive Front’ under Indian National Congress with Okram Ibobi Singh as chief minister. This coalition has won successive elections in 2007 and 2012.

The second women’s war 1939–40 From early British rule, Manipuri women had shown themselves to be capable of organizing for mass action when the occasion demanded (Parratt, 2005: 75). The First Women’s War of 1904 arose out of the Manipuri women’s resistance to the

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British Political Agent’s order that official bungalows destroyed during political violence against the imposition of compulsory labour should be rebuilt by Manipuri men. The activism of the Manipuri women forced the British Political Agent to take back his unjust order. Women’s popular protest mainly over the immigrant Marwari control of the rice harvest broke out sporadically since the 1920s. This led to the so-called Second Women’s War. Since 1891 the British had introduced land reforms to augment state finances. Revenue collection provided fresh opportunities for corruption and extortion. The farmers got into debt with the new practice of purchase of crops by the Marwaris in advance of the harvest at a lower price and their subsequent sale at a higher price. The newly emerging professional Manipuri middle classes invested in land which widened their separation from the farmers. The resulting rural unrest was a contributory factor in the ‘Second Women’s War’, an important event in the history of the state, which witnessed the emergence of Irabot Singh, a mass leader of significance. The system of forced labour and the compulsory provision of free services in the Hills led to abuse and extortion. Increasing poverty at one end and unaccounted power and corruption at the other end became the norm. Irabot Singh was among the few who were willing to align themselves with the rural and urban poor (Parratt, 2005: 83). Briefly, the Second Women’s War (Parratt, 2005: 77–89) began as a mass protest against the economic exploitation of the rice supply by Marwari traders who were aided and abetted by a corrupt king. It developed into a catalyst for democratic reform and provided a popular platform for the political activism of the elites who eventually overthrew the feudal regime. The First Women’s War of 1904 had been a protest by women against the ruling of Political Agent Maxwell that the Meitei men should rebuild colonial bungalows destroyed by arson. The activism of the Meitei women forced Maxwell to rescind his order and reach a compromise. Protests about the control

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of the rice harvest began in the 1920s. These culminated in the ‘second Nupilal’. The agitation began late in 1939 at the main market in the capital Imphal situated within the British Reserve and technically under the control of the Political Agent rather than the Maharaja or his Durbar. It was estimated that over 6,000 women traded in the huge market. The regular market women had their own individual places often passed down from mother to daughter. Manipuri women were seen by the British as very independent and prone to take direct action to get their way. The most important item traded in the market was rice. The rice consumed in the state was mainly husked by hand by the women. Most of the paddy that was milled was destined for export to Myanmar. Only three mills were owned by Meiteis but the bulk of the trade was in the hands of Marwaris. Export contracts were entered into by Marwari traders. Permits to export were required and a cart tax was imposed to control the export. The British Political Agent alone could authorize export of rice, and the cart tax provided sizable state revenue. In 1912, authorization for export was delegated to a trading company for a fixed payment. This change was exploited by the Marwari traders, who began to increase the amount of rice exported. This foreign involvement though not a great threat to the women’s livelihood in normal times became a threat in years of poor yield; the Marwaris bought up more rice than could reasonably be spared, which encouraged hoarding. Shortages with rising prices threatened the economic wellbeing of the women and the health of children as happened in late 1939. Prices escalated, and what little rice was available was bought up by the Marwari traders for processing in their own mills. It was then immediately exported or hoarded. The proportion of the exported rice increased significantly. The introduction of motorized transport helped larger exports. The real possibility of widespread hunger in late 1939 led the women to turn to the Political Agent Gimson and his assistant

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Sharpe for help. While Gimson was efficient and related well with Manipuris, his assistant, Sharpe was inexperienced. The situation deteriorated and riots broke out. Besides monopolizing the import and export trade, the Marwari traders were also bribing the Maharaja. Complaints against them increased. The rice issue was the culmination of many oppressive measures of the Maharaja Chura Chand, which struck at the heart of the economic life of the women and the well-being of their families. In September 1939 the export of rice was suspended. In October, the price had risen and supplies were running short. Small groups of women took matters into their own hands and prevented the bullock carts carrying rice from reaching the Marwari storehouses. Anti-Marwari feelings were inflamed by a report of insulting behaviour. Soon enough, some carts were seized and overturned and their loads scattered. Groups of women roamed the streets to prevent clandestine deliveries. Some were arrested and jailed. The women persuaded the Meitei mill owners to cease milling rice for export. On 12 December, a large number of women appealed to the Political Agent to reintroduce the ban on export. The latter, however, was away from the capital. The women then went to the Maharaja’s Durbar. The assistant superintendent of police was asked to summon the Political Agent. Orders were given for a complete survey of the rice stocks. The sanction of the Maharaja, essential for the operation, could not be obtained since he had proceeded on pilgrimage. The women who assembled in the market matched out demanding recall of the Maharaja. In the meantime, a solid phalanx of women surrounded the office of the Assistant to the Political Agent. Military officers who tried to get their way out of the crowd were also surrounded. The hostage taking was largely without violence. A platoon of the AR soldiers appeared which caused the crowd to erupt. Some of the soldiers were Kukis and Nepalis, and the sight of Hill men and foreigners with fixed bayonets pushing Meitei women aside incensed the bystanders. A violent reaction followed. Many women resisted stoutly and were severely manhandled.

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Now the men and children, who had been observers on the fringes of the crowd, joined the fray. The soldiers were pelted with stones. Many of the women were pushed into the cold waters of a nearby pond. The surrounded British officers could leave only by midnight. On 13 December, a large crowd of women gathered in the Police Bazar outside the British Reserve. The crowd swelled to around 10,000 and decided to march on the rice mills. The British Political Agent, who had by then returned to Imphal reasoned with the women and persuaded the owners to stop operating the mills. On 14 December, one of the Marwari mill owners tried to defy the ban on exports. The women organized a march on the mill. The resulting conflict polarized the situation and got caught up with deeper political motives. The agitating women were joined by male political activists. Hijam lrabot Singh who was not in Imphal, advised a colleague to address the gathering of women. Reports came that many of the women had been arrested. The police seemed determined on confrontation and charged the unarmed crowd with ‘lathis’. Three women were reportedly killed. Since the protests were basically led by women with the focus on an issue which affected them primarily, they resented men’s involvement at this stage. Both in its initial stages and in the demonstrations that followed for about a year, the bulk of the protesters were women. The reimposition of the ban on rice export and the disabling of the mills meant that the women’s war had effectively been won. The Second Women’s War demonstrated that the issues of the rice supply, market boycott and the inability of the police to keep order were symptoms of a deeper malaise. It opened up to public debate issues which had previously been the concern only of the emergent political elite. It underlined the incompetence, nepotism and corruption of Maharaja Chura Chand and the need for constitutional reforms. It shattered the Maharaja’s authority among the common people. The Political Agent and his superiors were highly critical of Chura Chand’s unpopular and corrupt regime.

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Hijam Irabot: a political radical (1896–1951) The ‘Second Women’s War’ represented a dramatic popularization of the struggle against feudalism till then confined to the educated elite. It was Hijam Irabot, a political radical, who seized upon this spontaneous grassroots movement to convert it into a nationalist movement. Irabot’s role in the Nikhil Manipuri Mahasabha (NMM) and the emergence of political movements had already been significant. He dominated Manipur’s political development in its most traumatic years from 1938 to 1951. He straddled the elite male political scene and the popular activism of the ‘Second Women’s War’. Irabot had a good education for the time and was connected by marriage to the king though his sympathies throughout his life were with the urban and rural poor. His achievements are more remarkable in that in his political career of a little over 14 years, more than half the time was spent in prison, exile or underground. Though his aims were eventually frustrated by the superior power of the feudal system and British colonial control and the process of integration with India, his legacy remains still strong within Manipur not only in the political mythology of folk memory but in the activity of Meitei insurgency movements. Hijam Irabot was born in 1896, a few years after the 1891 British occupation of Manipur. During his early years, he experienced the traumatic changes which accompanied British control of Manipur and the growing misery of the peasant farmers and urban poor with the advance of a market economy in the state. Irabot’s family was forcibly removed from their ancestral home in the newly created British Reserve without compensation and both his parents died while he was still young. His father’s sister, connected by marriage to the royal family, helped educate him. While at school he participated in protest movements and attended the informal discussion of older men on contemporary cultural, social and political issues. He and his elder cousin Sougaijam Somorendro (later a

40  A Manipur case study

leader of the Manipur State Congress) went to Dacca where he pursued further education and came into contact with the Meiteis of the Diaspora. In 1915, he left Dacca to tour other parts of India, including Guwahati, Cachar and Sylhet. This period marked the beginning of Irabot’s immersion in Meitei culture. On his return to Imphal at the age of nineteen he stayed in his aunt’s house. His growing prominence in the burgeoning Meitei renaissance as well as his excellence in sport, brought him to the attention of Maharaja Chura Chand, and not long after he married a daughter of one of the Maharaja’s elder brothers. Such a marriage brought with it some of the privileges dispensed by the king, including land grants. In 1930, Irabot was appointed as a member of the Sadder Panchayat Court. He showed himself to be a person of integrity in that he did not use this position as an opportunity to take bribes (as was common) but worked in the genuine interests of the welfare of the poor. He was already becoming a pioneer of Manipuri literature, a journalist and a poet. He excelled in traditional Meitei sports like polo. About this time, he began to study the writings of those involved in the Indian freedom struggle. His early life culminated in the formation in 1934 of the Nikhil Hindu Manipur Mahasabha (NHMM, later NMM). The NMM became overtly political and the word ‘Hindu’ was deleted from the name. Besides reiterating the need for economic progress including the need for Manipuri control of the marketing of locally produced fabric, the movement set out an explicit political agenda. The central planks were the need for common administration of the Valley and Hills together and the establishment of a representative elected government The NMM demanded the setting up of a Legislative Council for the attainment of fully representative form of government, elected by full adult franchise. Irabot’s presidential speech underlined the need to change the feudal nature of authority within the state. The NMM’s resolutions were a direct challenge to the authority of the Durbar, which put out a statement declaring that the NMM was a political organization. No government employee

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was permitted to be a member or to assist it in any way. All those who were state employees with the exception of Irabot and Elangbam Tompok (later to become a leader of the Manipur State Congress) resigned from their membership of the NMM. Irabot resigned from his lucrative position in the Sadar Panchayat Court and was obliged to hand back all the landed property of his wife. The Maharaja cut off contact with the NMM and the split between Irabot and the ruler was complete. In the following months, Irabot lobbied the Durbar on social, economic and political matters. High on his agenda was the proposal to abolish the many taxes which had been imposed on the common people. Irabot’s socialist vision of society included the abolition of large estates, public ownership of the hills and lakes and the removal of taxes on ferries, a fixed price for paddy, and the demand that the ownership of land should be with the tillers. Above all, his demand was replacement of the feudal government by a democratically elected government. In 1939, the Durbar came under British pressure to submit plans for reform. The NMM put forward its own proposals for a legislature which would have 80 per cent of its members elected by direct adult franchise. Irabot’s political platform was dramatically advanced by the outbreak of the ‘Second Women’s War’ in 1939. The war was on a purely economic issue but helped Irabot further his campaign for democratic government. In early 1940, when the NMM met to consider the women’s movement, a split occurred in the leadership. The conservative group distanced itself from the movement. Irabot and the more radical members supported the women’s demands and formed a new party, the Manipur Praja Sammeloni (MPS). Irabot addressed a large crowd and delivered a speech urging the men to take over the protest and to avenge the death of a woman at the hands of the police. The authorities reacted to Irabot’s attempt to channel the popular discontent into an attack on the whole feudal system of administration in Manipur. The demonstrations continued orchestrated by Irabot’s colleagues in the urban-based MPS and the rural Manipur Krishak Sammeloni (MKS). After being in prison, Irabot was convicted by the Durbar of making a

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seditious speech and jailed for 3 years. Irabot’s jail period was productive. During the time he was held in Imphal, he engaged in representations for the alleviation of the poor conditions within the prison. He was subsequently transferred to the Sylhet jail. This proved a fruitful period for his political education for his fellow detainees included a number of Indian Congress and communist workers. Irabot gained a greater understanding of Marxist–Leninist ideology and his left-wing convictions were strengthened. From his prison cell, he wrote asking for an early release so that he could mobilize Manipuri support for war against the ‘fascist’ Japanese. On his release in March 1943, Irabot was refused permission to return to Manipur. He spent time in Cachar under the auspices of the Communist Party of India (CPI), attended the inaugural CPI Congress, and was narrowly defeated as Communist candidate for the Silchar constituency in the Assam Provincial elections. All the while, he was becoming more deeply involved in peasant movements. Partly because of his association with the Communists he was again detained for several months in 1945. He was allowed a brief visit to Manipur, on compassionate grounds. In March 1946 the ban on his entry into home state was lifted. Manipur’s strategic position between India, Myanmar and China was affected under British rule. The export-import trade fell into the hands of the business class of the Marwaris who had migrated to Manipur during British rule. Trade in rice, Manipur’s largest product, came to be controlled by the Marwaris who did not re-invest their profits within the state. Their exploitation of the rice trade in the state became a big issue in mid-twentieth century. The import of cheaper goods from the rest of India and Britain adversely affected local production. The Hills suffered the most from poor administration. The British did not have the resources to police and administer these areas. Since the beginning of the British Raj in Manipur, the medical and educational care introduced by the Christian missionaries contributed to the ‘pacification’ of the tribal Hill areas in place of the military force used by the administration,

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which for most people had come in the shape of unreasonable demands and wanton violence. Manipuri intermediaries had undermined the authority of the traditional tribal elites. The recruitment of labour corps during the First World War alienated the Hills people for whom the British did not have a settled policy. A set of committed and idealistic British administrators advocated preservation of the traditional tribal way of life. The nonexistence of roads in the tribal areas led to conflicts between Kuki and Naga villages. The replacement of indirect rule of traditional authorities by direct British rule strained the limited resources of the authorities. Maharaja Chura Chand was faithful to the British during the First World War. The British separated the tribal Hills from the Manipuri Valley and administered them directly through an ICS officer who was Vice President of the Manipur State Durbar (MSD). Thus, 90 per cent of land area of the state and a third of the population were removed from the direct control of the Manipuri Maharaja. Even within the Valley the Maharaja’s control was curtailed. Most of the Indians from outside the state and the Marwari merchants lived and traded under British protection. The MSD was reconstituted for effective control; it had no jurisdiction over the British or the Hill peoples. The MSD acted as the highest judicial authority. However, the fiction of an independent kingdom was maintained. By appointing Chura Chand to the throne, the British effectively blocked the time-honoured Manipuri way of a palace coup to get rid of an unpopular, despotic ruler. Chura Chand was not popular and was not the natural ruler of the state (Dev and Lahiri, 1987: 102). The British were behind him supported by a battalion of the AR, which if withdrawn from Imphal, the state capital, would have caused a revolution in the state. In the first half of the twentieth century, the social base of the Maharaja and the Brahmins expanded. The British officials were concerned mainly with political control and their policy was not to get involved in religious affairs unless these became openly anti-British.

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The family of Chura Chand, realizing his unpopularity, used Hinduism to establish their own authority. A most oppressive form of Hindu practice was imposed on the people for the financial benefit of the king and his religious entourage. Traditionally, the Brahmins had not been an elitist group in Manipuri society. Chura Chand for his own benefit had started favouring a group which with his support became more reactionary. There was a conflict between two different understandings of Hinduism: liberal and reactionary. By the 1920s, the latter had found a new spokesman in Phurailatpam Atombapu Sharma, patronized by the Maharaja. His basic tenet was that Meiteis were part of a civilization which stretched back to the Brahmanical Hinduism of the Vedas. By the 1930s, Manipuri society witnessed an inflammable mix of social discontent and resentment against colonial control, which led to sporadic popular unrest in the Hills. A modified system of feudalism gave opportunities for corruption in high places from the king downwards and increasing divisions between rich and poor and peasant and elite. A western educated class, torn between the past and present and seeking a share in political and economic power emerged. These new tensions posed a threat to social stability and contributed to the Second Women’s War of 1939–40.

Nikhil Manipuri Mahasabha (NMM) The NMM, earlier known as NHMM, set up in 1933 led by Hijam Irabot Singh, challenged the feudal elite and bureaucracy ruling Manipur (Parratt: 94–6). Initially cultural, it became politically significant. Irabot stressed English education, Manipuri script, women and girls education, economic development and cultural renaissance. Polarization of views between radicals and conservatives led to a split in the organization in 1937. The Apokpa Marup, a new radical organization, sought to desanskritise the Meitei religion and called it ‘Sanamahi Movement’, after the pre-Hindu Meitei deity, Sanamahi. Its aims were to renounce Hinduism and revive traditional Meitei religion,

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culture and language and strengthen unity between the Meiteis and the Hill peoples. In 1938, the NHMM dropped the word ‘Hindu’ renamed itself NMM, a new political party that stood for democracy and social justice with Irabot Singh as President. The politicization of the NMM became part of the freedom struggle in India. It called for the ending of the separation of the Hills from the Valley in Manipur; the curtailment of feudalism in governance; and establishment of representative democracy. Irabot Singh demanded that the advisors of the Maharaja be elected persons with the people’s mandate. In 1939 the NMM was branded a political organization forcing Irabot Singh and others to become full-time political activists. By 1940 Maharaja Chura Chand himself put forward a plan to set up an elected legislative assembly. The ‘Second Women’s War’, which erupted was followed by the Second World War on the eastern front. NMM under Irabot Singh initiated modern politics in the state in the early 1940s. Under Irabot’s leadership, the Manipur Krishak Sangha (MKS) in 1944 discussed the shape of Manipuri politics in the emerging independent India. MKS, a rural socialist party had its urban counterpart in Manipur Praja Sangha (MPS). The MPS came out strongly in support of the ‘Second Women’s War’. The Krishak Sabha and the Praja Sabha played a leading role in the dramatic events of 1947–49. Irabot recognized the potential role of the emerging educated younger generation. The rump of the new NMM became the Manipur Congress Party. Hijam Irabot Singh dominated Manipur politics throughout the traumatic events of its modern history (Parratt and Parratt, 2000:275–88). Irabot spent about 14 years in political activity, and for more than half of it, was either in prison, exile or was working underground. His aims were frustrated by the superior power of the feudal system and British colonial control over Manipur till 1947 and by the trend towards integration with India. His legacy remains strong in the continued role of Meitei ‘insurgency’ movements. Irabot Singh was a convinced Manipuri nationalist and revolutionary democrat. He envisaged the continued existence of

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Manipur as a self-governing state under an elected legislature, which would embrace on an equal footing, both Hills and the Valley. His impact on Manipuri politics in terms of a push towards democracy and socialism was powerful. Irabot gave the ‘Second Women’s War’ of 1939–40 a clear political direction. The First and the Second Women’s War of Manipur and the positive intervention of Hijam Irabot Singh in the latter should be seen as the beginning of the modern women’s movement in Manipur, which later led to the emergence of doughty fighting women such as Thangjam Manorama Devi, Irom Sharmila and Neena Ningombam (see Chapter 5) in the recent period. Irabot was ahead of his time in proposing a ‘one-manone-vote’ system opposing the franchise based on land ownership and education. However, in October 1949, the democratically elected state legislature was summarily dissolved by the new government of India and a chief commissioner appointed to rule the state. Irabot, along with other Manipuri leaders leaving aside those of the Manipur Congress, viewed the enforced merger with India as an act of deceit. Irabot was convinced that there was no alternative to armed resistance. Maharajkumar Priyabroto Singh, former chief minister of Manipur best summed up Irabot Singh as a leader who could have been chief minister in his place.

Pre-1949 resistance in the Hills After the British occupation in 1891, the Hills of Manipur came under the direct control of the British. The traditional barter economy was disrupted. Free labour (‘pothang’) continued to be practiced by the ‘lambus’ (intermediaries) in the Hills. British control was imperfect due to lack of communications but it was enforced through the ‘military promenade’. The imposition of an alien, oppressive monetary economy and the advent of Christianity in place of age-old traditional custom and ritual gave birth to resistance movements. Two of these movements were the Kuki Ethnic Movement and the Jadonang Movement.

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Neither represented any unified or concerted action. The Kuki resistance came from the British policy of raising a labour corps for the First World War. In May 1917, the first batch of about 2,000 Kukis and Nagas were recruited. The Thadous took the lead in opposing the recruitment. In December 1917, they raided the south of the Valley. The AR proved ineffective in dealing with the Thadous and suffered heavy casualties. Then, the Thadous destroyed the telegraph lines and cut the road to Burma. The Burmese Chins, ethnically related to the Kukis, had already risen in revolt. In early 1918, other Kuki clans, taking advantage of the unrest, tried to settle scores with their traditional enemy, the Nagas. The Kabuis, Thangkuls and the Koms suffered from violent attacks and the AR was dispatched to protect them. A concerted campaign in 1919 quashed the rebellion. The more dangerous challenge to British administration came from the Jadonang Movement. The ethnic Kabui (Rongmei) Nagas had suffered during the ethnic violence involving the Kukis. The Jadonang Movement was partly an outcome of the Kabui resentment on this score. The movement was confined to the three clans which were included in the Zeliangrong group led by Jadonang who preached about a god called ‘Tengwa’. Jadonang’s cousin, the 16-year-old girl Gaidinlui, helped spread the movement. The Jadonang movement was not just a millenarian tribal movement but a genuine, spontaneous uprising against the injustices of British colonialism (Lintner, 2012: 60). In contrast to the Kuki revolt which was a political uprising, the Jadonang Movement had deep religious roots centred on the veneration of deities or spirits. By 1927, the British apprehended Jadonang for criminal activities accusing him of spreading false propaganda against the British and hanged him. Gaidinlui became the new leader of the Jadonang Movement. The British captured and jailed her in 1933. She became the first Naga leader to be recognized as a freedom fighter by the Indian nationalist movement. The Jadonang cult was the first serious clash between the new social and religious order of the Naga Hills and the old beliefs (Lintner, 2012: 61).

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Conflict dynamics after 1972 Indian independence was followed by Manipur attaining full statehood in 1972 after prolonged agitation. From 1972 to 1975, it remained an independent state of the Indian Union. After the Emergency from 1975 to 1977 it reverted to democracy. It was placed under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, I 1958 (AFSPA) in September 1980. The Act was never revoked except in some municipal areas of Imphal. The post-1949 decline of Manipur was due to several factors (Sanajouba, 1988: 245–90): the restrictive attitude of successive Indian governments; threat to territorial integrity; steep population rise from migration; huge expenditure on Indian security forces; depletion of local industries and agriculture; lack of basic infrastructure and amenities; culture of corruption; and failure of central development aid to improve quality of life. Other issues too exerted powerful influence on political and economic life. Socioeconomic rights took a back seat yielding place to political rights violations including killings, rapes, disappearances, arbitrary arrests and so on. These were not of external origin but internal factors played a part too. The failure of the political leadership calls for explanation. Manipur faced political instability from defections and rampant corruption; multiplicity of small parties; party hopping and neglect of pragmatic policies; and divide between the Hills and the Valley. Political conflict, however, was not simply ethnic; it also stemmed from personal power game, ambition to gain ministerial posts and control over state finances. By the February 2002 election, public outrage at political self-seeking and greed became manifested (Parratt and Parratt, 2003: 99–109). All the candidates in the elections contested on local issues, especially the maintenance of state integrity after the 2001 riots over the Naga ceasefire extension, clean administration, rejection of party hopping, anticorruption measures and a pledge to bring peace and security. A Congress coalition was led by Okram Ibobi called the Secular Progressive Front government with modest achievements. No progress was made on a peace

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deal with underground movements. The Congress High Command, on receiving persistent complaints of administrative corruption, issued an ultimatum to the Chief Minister to remove tainted ministers. Sarin (1980: 12) identified political and administrative corruption as the principal cause of growing discontent in Manipur. In 2000, the central government told the state government to allow the CBI to investigate corruption charges. The concern was that rampant corruption and misuse of official development funds were driving young people to join insurgency movements. At the same time, the Union Home Ministry asked for a report on alleged connections of politicians with insurgency movements. A number of public institutions were suspected to be under the patronage of underground elements. An underground organization in 2004 awarded the death penalty to a Member of Parliament and Chairman of the Manipur BJP for offending its sensitivities during an election campaign. Again, another insurgent group ordered the Congress party to stop electioneering under threat of punishment. A third organization gave an ultimatum to members of the State Assembly to denounce the activities of the security forces. The state chief minister was compelled to appeal to the central government for the dispatch of additional central paramilitary forces. These incidents highlighted some of the new factors in Manipur politics: the tendency of insurgents to threaten public figures with violence and disruption; the lack of integrity and courage on the part of leading politicians; and the lack of confidence on the part of security forces (despite their huge numbers) in protecting life and preserving law and order. It seemed that corruption had spread to all sectors and had got institutionalized. It was estimated that three-quarters of all development funds were lost in bribes and hand-outs at one level or another. Many NGOs were reportedly being run by politicians connected to underground elements. Some members of the security forces were accused of drug-running and illegal-logging. The dire economic condition of the state was partly due to endemic corruption. Huge population increase, especially in

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the Valley, which has only 10 per cent of the state’s land area, stretched its resources, which, however, were nonexistent in the Hills (Sarin, 1980). The Annual Plan (2012–13) of the government of Manipur referred to the Look East Policy of the early 1990s aiming at closer economic cooperation and integration of the north-eastern region with the fast growing economies of South East Asia; it drew attention to the regional groupings for cooperation such as the BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiatives for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation). While the Manipur Human Development Report noted a steady decline in urban poverty, it highlighted unemployment among the youth (36.7 per cent of the population) as a major challenge (MHDR, 2005: 32). The educated unemployed, the root cause of social unrest, had touched 4.17 lakh out of the total population of the state.

Ethnic conflicts About thirty ethnic communities and tribes, ‘territorially defined political units’ (Zehol, 2008) live in Manipur, the most prominent being the Meiteis in the Valley. The Hill tribes are loosely classified into the Naga and the Kuki-Mizo-Chin groups. Many militant groups operate (see Appendix IV). Apart from demanding secession and attacking government facilities, these groups indulge in maiming or killing innocent civilians and government personnel and resort to collection or extortion of money in the name of ‘taxes’, dictate codes of behaviour and arbitrate in personal disputes. Others try to ‘cleanse’ society by fighting corruption and social evils. Thus, violence has become a way of life in Manipur. Killings and counter-killings by insurgents and security forces are a daily occurrence, with innocents caught in the crossfire. The MHDR 2005 reported that between 1993 and 2003, the number of ‘encounter deaths’ was 1,598 (692 security personnel, 767 insurgents and 139 civilians). Much of the violence was between ethnic groups arising from the compulsions of electoral politics. Other issues such as job reservations for Scheduled Tribes and the lop-sided development between Hills and the Valley led to distrust and enmity between communities.

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Insurgent groups believe that independence from India would usher in a new economic dawn. Once a person joins a group it becomes very difficult for him to leave it. The government unveiled a surrender-cum-rehabilitation policy in 1996 with grants and benefits to those who surrendered. Many surrendered; some were absorbed in government service including the police. However, former militants noticed a lack of sincerity in the efforts to help them. They have formed the Ex-militants Development Association since the cash incentives were seen as meagre, not paid or delayed and for only a limited period. They were compelled to join the counter-insurgency forces against their wishes. This discourages the militants from coming back to the mainstream of society.

The history of Thoiba I am Thoiba (name changed). I was a member of one of the militant groups in Manipur. Now I have surrendered. I joined my former organization because I believed that our history, culture and our language with a script of its own ­entitled us to be an independent, sovereign nation. The organization I joined was based on sound principles and had strict rules and regulations. I felt proud to be a part of such an organization. It did not take long, however, for disillusionment to set in. There was petty politicking within the organization. Funds were misused. Money collected in the name of the party was used to make personal profit. Members would enter into arrangements with particular government officers, agreeing not to harness them in exchange for help in cornering contracts and schemes. I was disillusioned by the leadership. Ideological confusion set in. There was a yawning gap between the leaders and cadre. We lived in the forest and faced numerous dangers but when we had a problem nobody seemed to be listening to us. I also began to realize that my dream for an independent nation was an unrealistic one. The governments of other countries sympathetic to our cause were no longer willing to antagonize the Indian government. Finally I decided to surrender. Source: (MHDR, 2005: 175)

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Ethnic clashes and militancy create difficulties for women. When male members of the family are killed or have joined the militancy, the burden of keeping the home fires burning falls to the women. There is barely a village which has not been affected by militancy, armed conflict or ethnic violence. Women and children pay a heavy price by being victimized by both the underground and the security forces. Women have often to adhere to the dress and other moralistic codes enforced by the militants. The Manipur Constitution Act 1947 led to the formation of a unicameral legislature. At the time of merger in 1949 the state was moving towards a popular, constitutional and democratic government. However, the legislative assembly was dissolved and all power went to the newly appointed Chief Commissioner. Under the new Indian Constitution, Manipur transited from a Part C state in 1950 through Union Territory in 1957 to full statehood in 1972. The Emergency of 1975, which curtailed the new hope of genuine democracy, was followed by a brief spell of democratic government from 1977 to 1980 when the state was declared a ‘disturbed area’ under the AFSPA.

Decline of democracy There has been a decline of democracy in Manipur ever since 1949. Political instability, pervasive electoral corruption and politicization on ethnic-electoral lines have aggravated the crisis of governance. Multiparty democracy multiplied divisions. The formation of districts and constituencies not on the basis of administrative convenience but in order to club together ethnically-aligned tribes and communities has led to monopolization of constituencies by dominant communities. Manipur is forced to grapple with its own definition of a state ‘mainstream’ that can accommodate the diverse interests of all communities with several recognized and unrecognized political parties working along ethnic lines. The Kuki-Naga ethnic conflict in the early 1990s was a result of divisive politics. Ethnicity-based vote bank politics has undermined the concept of representative democracy.

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Manipur constituencies are small, making it possible for a candidate to win by patronizing a particular community, ignoring others. Tribal loyalties lead to enmasse voting in elections. Thus, a few communities, mainly Meiteis, Nagas and Kukis, dominate elections and the others are left out. Democracy is not just about majorities but involves protection of minorities too. Policy formulation has been a casualty in Manipur with twelve governments from 1985 to 2002, in place of three of 5 years each. Some stability, however, was seen from 2002 to 2012 under the Congress government of Ibobi Singh. Still engagement with insurgent groups has not taken place. In a situation of increasing lawlessness, justice delivery has been problematic. The rate of convictions in police cases declined from 420 in 1970–71 to 7 in 2001–02 as reported in the Manipur Human Development Report (MHDR, 2005: 222). The annual plan document of the government of Manipur for the year 2012 noted a decline in drop-out rates in primary education and reduction of the number of out of school children. Independent observers provide a grim picture of the kind of distorted education that goes on in the Hill districts of the state (Kikon, 2006; Aman Trust, 2007). Accountability and responsiveness to people’s problems need effective decentralization and provision of funds, functions and functionaries to local bodies. MHDR, 2005, traces the history of Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) in the state from 1960 to 1994, when the 73rd Constitution (Amendment) Bill 1992, became effective in the Valley to strengthen the PRIs. Two elections under the new Act took place in 1997 and 2002 for 165 Gram Panchayats and four Zilla Parishads with no intermediate Panchayat Samitis as yet. Women’s representation stood at 40 per cent. However, powers and functions were not devolved in line with the Eleventh Schedule of the Constitution. PRIs are involved mainly in the implementation of central development schemes. State-sponsored schemes are left out of the PRIs. Further, PRIs do not supervise the functioning of primary schools and health centres, which defeats the purpose of staff accountability to the public. Financial devolution has not taken place.

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After independence, the Government of India set up the Fifth and Sixth Schedules in the Constitution to safeguard the interests of the tribal people. The Fifth Schedule applies to tribal areas in ‘mainstream’ states. The Sixth Schedule, conceived as an instrument of tribal self-rule, operates in the Northeast in Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram. Arunachal Pradesh was under the Sixth Schedule but later adopted Panchayati Raj with some additional safeguards provided in the Constitution. Nagaland, though theoretically under the Sixth Schedule was never governed by its provisions in practice after it became a state in 1962. The tribal Hill districts of Manipur, inhabited mainly by Naga and Kuki tribespeople, were never included in the Fifth or the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. These districts are governed under the controversial Manipur (Hill Areas) District Councils Act, 1971. First, the district councils in this Act are not autonomous but function under the Deputy Commissioners of the district who functions as ‘Administrator’. Second, executive functions in the maintenance of schools, dispensaries, roads and some aspects of management of land and forest can be exercised by the autonomous councils only when entrusted to them by the ‘Administrator’. Third, the Act does not confer any legislative powers on the district councils, which can only make recommendations. All judicial powers remain with the state government (Bhatia, 2010: 42). Thus, the district administration exercises overall control over the district council in executive, legislative and judicial matters. The Councils do not possess the financial, administrative and functional powers of an effective local self-government. The PRIs which exist in the Valley have limited resources and manpower at their command. The Hill areas, briefly allowed to elect District Councils, have effectively reverted to direct administration under the Deputy Commissioners of districts. The discontinuation of the traditional community management system and the absence of grassroots participative democracy in the Hill areas have led to strident demands for the extension of Sixth Schedule status. The feeling of alienation is accentuated with the line departments, which hitherto worked through their district offices, increasingly becoming centralized with almost

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all development schemes being formulated and implemented from Imphal. Security of life, an essential prerequisite, does not exist in Manipur given the activity of numerous insurgent groups and a variety of central and state security forces. Abductions, summary trial by kangaroo courts, forced disappearances, and shootings by insurgents and security forces have accentuated the threat to human security. Ethnic hostility between the Kukis and the Nagas and between the Kukis and the Paiutes has frequently led to loss of life. The Kuki-Naga hostilities go back to the 1917 Kuki rebellion against the British who forced a divide between the Zeliangrong Nagas and the Kukis. Today, the Kukis reject the relations with the Nagas established by the British and want equality with them. The biggest Kuki-Naga ethnic conflict took place in 1992 when 523 Kukis and 264 Nagas were killed; a total of 432 were injured and 5,713 houses burnt. The conflict between the Kukis and the Paites in Churachandpur in 1997 saw 226 killed; 134 injured; and 4,808 houses destroyed. The victims included other ethnic communities such as the Vaipehis, Simtes, Zous, Koms, Mizos, Hmars and Tiddim Chin as well (Parratt, 2005: 176). Clashes between rival ethnic groups in interior areas have led to a climate of fear among the public and the local administration. Government functionaries of one community refuse to work in areas dominated by another community. People in the Hills feel neglected over perceived centralization of power in Imphal dominated by the Meiteis. The demography of the state contributes to this mistrust. The Hills constitute 90 per cent of the state area, meant exclusively for the tribal people. Non-tribal people are prohibited from buying tribal land.

Human rights violations Human rights violations became common under the AFSPA, imposed on the state in September, 1980. Such violations are a denial of democratic governance. Security forces often resort to high-handed action to establish dominance over militant groups

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during searches, operations and ambushes. Frequent failures to take action against misuse of powers by security forces do tend to tarnish the image of these forces. Public opinion is strong against the continuance of the AFSPA in the state. The Manipur Human Rights Commission (MHRC) set up in 1998 has not been able to function effectively as a result of official efforts to make it ineffective. Several groups such as the ‘Meira Paibis’ (‘women torch bearers’) and other human rights organizations are active in civil society to maintain a peaceful atmosphere. Recognizing the role of civil society, the state government has made efforts to set up community policing. The media’s possible role in the area of good governance has been undermined since the insurgent groups have been able to interfere with media functioning. The intertwined challenges of governance in Manipur need to be met at the political, economic and social arenas. Development and prosperity cannot be achieved in a poor security environment. While maintaining law and order is a priority, there is a need to engage the insurgent groups in a meaningful dialogue. Grievances must be addressed without delay and without succumbing to pressure tactics and unreasonable demands. The Manipur Human Development Report (MHDR, 2005: 209) defined governance as a process of administration as well as a kind of statecraft for fashioning the tools of administration. It prioritizes the latter as a must in making the political system find appropriate tools to deal with long-term problems. Specific issues for policy initiatives mentioned in the (MHDR, 2005: 236–7) are: (i) educated unemployment; (ii) deteriorating standard of education; (iii) empowerment of local bodies; (iv) management of human resources and provision of irrigation water; (v) stimulation of agricultural production, stabilization of prices for the farming community; (vi) resolving issues relating to the Loktak Lake; (vii) promotion of border trade with Southeast Asian countries; (viii) improvement of road and rail connectivity; (ix) enhanced central assistance to generate resources to meet the revenue expenditure and create a strong and robust resource base; (x) enhance hydro-power potential; (xi) transfers

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of funds from central authorities to improve human development potential; (xii) creation of a peaceful environment to attract private investment; and (xiii) elimination of leakage of resources to insurgents. Manipuri society both in the Valley and in the Hills is divided between the elites and the marginalized classes. Stratification based on economic status has created class distinctions among the tribal populations (Horam, 2000: 196). Sharper class distinction between the extended royal family and the development of an educated class in society in the early twentieth century led to a social divide based not on birth but on access to formal education. The Manipur Congress party of the newly educated elites felt threatened by the grassroots movements led by Irabot Singh, the radical socialist leader who was successfully excluded from the political process. More recent times have seen a massive expansion in higher education leading to the emergence of a large number of graduates who cannot be absorbed within the local economy. In 2004, according to official figures, unemployment rose by over 80 per cent in the previous decade. Further, statistics suggest that over 40 per cent of the population live below the poverty line (Nepram, 2002: 201). Ninety-three per cent of the jobs in the state are in the government sector, which lead to acute competition for posts. Substantial bribes are often demanded and public office has come to be seen as an avenue for personal gain. In this situation, dedication to development and a strong work ethic is less important than survival. Venality has encouraged a culture of dependence. The illegal importation of narcotics and the consequent spread of the HIV virus (Nepram, 2002) made the drugs problem serious; a close connection between drugs, arms trade, organized crime and bribery developed. Manipur is one of the main routes for the smuggling of drugs from South East Asia and their export to the West, which is explored by Nepram in her book mentioned above. The several ethnic groups in the state cannot be simply classified as Meiteis, Nagas, Kukis or Chins. There are subdivisions. The Kuki-Chins, earlier seen as Lushais, are now being redefined

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as Mizos, Zomis, Kukis and Chins. The category of the ‘Nagas’ did not begin as a term of self-definition. The term ‘Naga’ was applied to an area (Naga Hills) as also to a conglomeration of ethnic clans. Parratt (2005: 218) has suggested that the Naga extremist claims over northern Manipur arise from a much later agenda of a postulated construct of common ethnicity. The political concept of ‘Nagalim’ first surfaced in the 1990s. Unilateral claims to parts of Manipur were advanced especially by T. Muiva, leader of the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN) who himself hails from Ukhrul in Manipur. The Indian Constitution has clear guidelines for the alteration of state borders which involve consultations with the state governments concerned. Quite apart from the fact that the northern Hills of Manipur has a considerable number of Kukis, the separation of four Hill districts of Manipur (parts of which are also claimed by the Kukis) would make the state too small to be viable. The huge extent of popular feeling in Manipur against the ‘Nagalim’ project was manifested during the negotiations between the Government of India and the NSCN, over a 4-year ceasefire extension agreement in 2001. None of the chief ministers of Assam, Manipur or Arunachal Pradesh were consulted about the agreement. All the three states demanded that the extension clause be revoked. Widespread demonstrations and violence took place. It was clear that any threat to the territorial integrity of Manipur would not be tolerated and that the NSCN-IM claims on Northern Manipur would be unacceptable. From 1891 to 1947 the British retained control over the Hill areas of Manipur on the alleged ground that the Hindus of the Valley would exploit the relatively unsophisticated tribal people. After 1947, a sustained policy of equal representation of all the ethnic groups has been followed in the state. Spending on the Hills which has a population of around one-third of the state has averaged 40 per cent of the state budget and a good proportion of other spending is for the common benefit of all citizens. Reservation of jobs and scholarships for the STs in fact favours the tribals over the Meiteis and they dominate in the civil service both within and outside the state. The reservation

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system has been deeply divisive in Manipur and has resulted in the absurdity of the Meiteis being declared as Other Backward Classes, not eligible for reservation in government jobs. The cause of under-development of the Hill areas is simply that the funding allocated does not reach the target because corruption is equally prevalent among all ethnic groups. Reasons for the under-development in the Hill areas are complex and points not so much to the exploitation of one ethnic group by another but to the level of corruption and division within all ethnic groups.

Insurgent groups The activities of the insurgent groups in Manipur mentioned in Appendix IV have been analysed in several studies (Prabhakara, 2012; Lintner, 2012; Rammohan, 2011; Verghese, 2004). The significant role of Hijam Irabot Singh in the politics of the state needs to be noted along with his views on the future of Manipur and the factors that led to his exit from state politics. The influence of his ideas however remained. The first group of insurgents was followed by another which called itself the Revolutionary Government of Manipur (RGM). About 200 youths led by O Sudhir, N Bisheshar, Dhaneshwar and RK Sanatomba went to the then East Pakistan seeking training and assistance. However, the liberation war in East Pakistan (1971) put paid to these efforts. The United Liberation Front (UNLF), formed by Arambam Somerendra took to arms in 1976. Rajkumar Meghen alias Sanayaima, descendant of Rajkumar Tikendrajit of the 1891 Anglo-Manipuri war, joined the group and established contact with the Naga underground in Myanmar. The 1975 agreement between the Government of India and the Naga underground was not to the liking of some Nagas such as Muivah, Isaac Swu and SS. Khaplang who went on to set up the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) in 1980. The PLA from Manipur and later the United Liberation Front (UNLF) of Assam joined them indicating the common interest of rebel groups of the region. Links with the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) of Myanmar followed.

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Sanayaima was responsible for instigating violence on the part of UNLF. In May 1990, the UNLF announced the formation of the Indo-Burma Revolutionary Front (IBRF) with the main objective of getting liberation for Assam, Manipur and the formation of ‘Nagalim’ (comprising Naga-inhabited areas in the region). In 1978, N Bisheshar formed the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and sought to establish contact with the Chinese. The same year, RK Tulachandra formed the People’s Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK). PLA and PREPAK sought to snatch arms from the police and the paramilitary forces. The Manipur valley was under severe tension during and after 1978. The increasing violence led to the declaration of the state as a ‘disturbed area’ under the AFSPA in 1980. Government of India, under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, banned the PLA, PREPAK and the Kangleipak Communist Party (KCP) and the Kanglei Yawol Kanba Lup (KYKL), formed earlier. Governor VK Nayar attempted to contain the illegal actions of the security forces during the early 1990s but after his departure, the history of insurgency in Manipur has been one of a series of custodial deaths and extrajudicial killings. Rammohan (2011: 132) indicates a link between the state political leadership and some of the insurgent groups. It was stated that intra-ministerial rivalry was a causative factor in the Naga-Kuki clashes in the early 1990s and Meitei insurgency. Controversy over the situation led to the resignation of the state governor in 1994. Subsequently, the state government created the Manipur Police Commandos, a crack unit under the command of an Inspector General of Police, for containing the militancy, which became notorious for extracting money from the traders in the Paona Bazaar of Imphal city and for brutal extra-judicial executions. Rammohan, former advisor to the governor of Manipur reports that a central intelligence agency created the Kuki militant group, Kuki National Organization (KNO), which later split into two with different names and became brigands extorting money from government agencies and others with the protection of politicians who were keen on

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protecting their electoral constituencies. Over the years more splinter groups came up some of whom were working for the government (Rammohan, 2011: 137). While the army and the paramilitary forces were deployed in abundance, the insurgency groups the PLA and the UNLF were ‘intact’ in Myanmar and continued to operate in Manipur, extracting money from the government, its employees and private parties. Corruption in the government was said to be worse than ever; the state government drifted aimlessly; and the central government was unable to intervene. In 2010, Sanayaima, chief of UNLF, was said to be in Bangladesh. After the emergence of a new government in India, Sanayaima was said to have been captured by Bangladesh and handed over to the government. The insurgents in the state who are mostly urban youths receive active support from the urban middle classes and intellectuals. The insurgency is a product of factors such as the crisis of identity, weakness of the political system, economic exploitation, bureaucratic corruption, unemployment and the ‘influence of foreign powers and faith in Marxian ideology’. Sections of the urban elites actively supported integration of the state with the Indian political system. In 1949, the people were keen to get rid of the feudalism of the monarchy and wished to have democracy. But in place of democracy under the Indian Constitution, Manipuris were subjected to direct central rule for 23 turbulent years (1949–72), which affected the people and poisoned relations with the Government of India. Corruption in getting employment opportunities was a major cause of discontent. Manipur’s first chief minister, MKP Singh was of the view that Hijam Irabot Singh was a true leader who loved the poor farmers and tirelessly worked for them. Singh said that the feeling among small communities in the Northeast was that they needed to adopt ‘attitudes’, in order not to be swamped under rapid political developments. However, instead of getting united under one identity, there was a tendency to break into groups. The military, meant to fight against foreign aggressors, was used to put down the people. Politicians had messed up things by

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entrusting the army with police duties. Finding lasting solutions and bringing peace was not the job of the army. Manipur, which had had a secluded existence was suddenly exposed to the hurly burly of politics. Life in the plains became difficult for the people who were exploited by traders from outside. The freedom of movement guaranteed under the Constitution led to massive influx of outsiders. The supremacy of law and justice was not established. The enforced rule from New Delhi, the poor quality of earlier chief commissioners, the induction of large paramilitary forces to suppress the people had its consequences and resulted in the strengthening of the movement for autonomy, which turned into a full-scale insurgency with secessionist tendencies. The dismissal of the infant democratic government in Manipur in 1949 also had its own effect. The bankruptcy of Manipur’s internal politics provided an incentive to the excluded to throw in their lot with the emerging militancy. It was almost inevitable that the undercurrent of discontent would erupt into violence, which had two features in the 1960s: escalation of legitimate protest against police and paramilitary repression leading to secessionism and armed resistance (Parratt, 2005: 130). Apart from the Meiteis in the Valley the Kukis and the Nagas in the Hills advanced competing demands over identity and territory (Kipgen, 2013: 8). Other communities such as the Hmars also made their own demands. Manipur became a ‘cauldron of competing demands’. Mindless repression over several decades led July 2012 to an important development: Neena Ningombam, Secretary, Extrajudicial Execution Victim Families Association Manipur (EEVFAM) submitted a petition to the Supreme Court of India seeking justice for the innocents killed in extra-judicial executions by security forces taking advantage of the AFSPA.

Naga-Kuki ethnic conflict While insurgents collect ‘taxes’ all over the Northeast, the situation has worsened in Manipur because of the number of rebel

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groups that exist. In the 1990s, bloody turf warfare between NSCN (IM) and the various Kuki rebel outfits in Manipur led to hundreds of civilian deaths. The stated aim of the KNO is a separate Kuki dominated land. NSCN (IM) has alleged that the KNO is a proxy organization created by the Indian intelligence. A weakened NSCN (IM) would help India’s strategic aims in the region. Naga, Kuki and Manipuri groups maintain good relations with the local political and administrative agencies. State politicians depend on critical underground support in local elections and the latter in turn are able to move around the state, hide and collect ‘taxes’. There is in Manipur a solid, symbiotic relationship between state politicians and authorities on one side and various rebel groups on the other.

Naga-Meitei ethnic conflict The Naga-Meitei conflict in Manipur is equally serious. The proposed visit of the Naga leader Muivah to his home in Somdal in the Ukhrul district in early 2010 led to a confrontation between the two communities. The state government, for fear of his political activities, sent paramilitary forces to stop him from entering Manipur by road. A 69-days blockade was organized by Naga student groups of the National Highway 39, the main road to Imphal, which enters Manipur from Nagaland. The blockade caused shortages in Manipur of essential commodities, which deepened the divide between the two communities. In retaliation, the Meitei groups organized a counter-blockade movement of essential items from the Valley to the Hills. Activists and politically minded intellectuals from other parts of India intervened mainly in support of the Nagas. The blockade was eventually lifted but Muivah never made it to his home village. Manipur’s many problems remain unresolved and are getting more serious. The civil society group of ‘Meira Paibis’ have been active in resolving conflicts but opinion about their role remains divided. They became famous when twelve of them demonstrated in the nude in front of the AR headquarters in the ancient Kangla Fort in July 2004 in the

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wake of the rape and killing by the troops of the 17th AR of the 32-year-old woman Thangjam Manorama. ‘Meira Paibis’ also play the ‘moral police’ role and try to impose a kind of Victorian morality on young people. It is not easy to be young in Manipur where violence, a deep-rooted gun culture, drugs, lack of development, unemployment, a draconian AFSPA and then the ‘Meira Paibis’ prevail. Hence, many Manipuris like to stay away from their home state and prefer to live in places like Delhi. ‘Manipur is the “gateway to South East Asia”, which needs some serious mending before it can have some real economic and social development’ (Lintner, 2012: 181).

More on Meitei militancy Several phases marked the development of Meitei militancy (Bhaumik, 2009: 110). In the last decade, both PLA and UNLF have emerged stronger. Since 2003, the Manipuri rebel groups have done better than their counterparts in Nagaland holding on to base areas against severe military onslaught. The recent arrest of Sana Yaima by the Bangladesh authorities was a huge setback to the UNLF. The PLA has been less active. The atrocities by the AR in 2000 led to renewed demands for repeal of the AFSPA supported by the heroic indefinite fast of Irom Sharmila from that year to the present. The report of the Justice Jeevan Reddy Committee set up in 2005 to look into the working of the AFSPA proved a damp squib. Inter-ethnic strife between Manipuris and the Nagas over the territorial integrity of the state and between Nagas and Kukis over the Kuki demand for an autonomous district pose serious threats to internal security. Even as the violence in Assam gets more complicated with the recent violence in the Bodoland area (July–September, 2012) and the Naga talks and their ultimate outcome continue to remain subject to speculation, the Government of India appears short of ideas on how to go about resolving the multiple conflicts in Manipur involving the Nagas, the Meiteis and the non-Naga tribes, the Kukis, the Paites and the Hmars, who

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too play an important role in the state’s politics. No indication is available yet of talks, if any, with Sana Yaima, leader of the powerful PLA, now in official custody. Uncertainty and drift seem to be the order of the day in the state. After the 2003 Naga demand for greater Nagaland, the relations between the Nagas and the Meiteis have been deteriorating. The latest indication of this came from a recent incident in which a Meitei actress was molested and assaulted by an NSCN (IM) leader in Imphal and the ugly realities it exposed. What of the future? The state Assembly has sixty seats of which forty are held by the Meiteis and twenty by the tribal communities (the Nagas have eleven and the Kukis, the Paites and the Hmars together have nine). The various insurgent groups from the non-Naga tribes are in Suspension of Operations with the government and political dialogue under the umbrella organizations of the United People’s Front (UPF) and the KNO.

Insurgencies: overview The several insurgencies in Manipur affect not only the majority Meitei community but also others including the Manipuri Nagas, the Kukis, the Hmar, Paites and others who demand local autonomy. Militant organizations run a ‘parallel government’ in many districts influencing state government decisions in the award of contracts, of supply orders and on the postings and recruitment of government officials including the police. Widespread extortion and dispensation of ‘justice’ are also practised eroding constitutional governance. The central figure in these insurgencies was Hijam Irabot Singh. He visited Tripura in 1915, acquired a Marxist understanding and returned to Manipur as full activist. The ‘First Women’s War’ of 1904 had been against the unjust role of the Political Agent. Irabot Singh was a major influence behind the ‘Second Women’s War’ of 1939–40. He agitated for the formation of a Legislative Assembly but was arrested and held prisoner in Sylhet. After the 1949 integration of Manipur, he prepared the ground for an ‘Independent Peasant Republic’ and formed

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the Red Guards. Moving to Myanmar he linked up with the insurgent Communist Party of Burma (CPB). After the death of Irabot Singh in September 1951, the second stage of the militant movement started in November 1964 with the United National Liberation Front (UNLF) set up by Arambam Samarendra Singh. A breakaway faction led by Oinam Sudhir Kumar established a RGM in Sylhet supported by Pakistani intelligence services, already in touch with Naga and Mizo militants. The Manipuris were Marxist while the Naga and Mizo rebels were influenced by Christianity. The Nagas had had military training in East Pakistan. After the Bangladesh liberation war in 1971 about 150 Manipuri rebels were captured by the Indian army. Manipur became an Indian state in 1972 and the rebels renewed contact with China. A former RGM member, Nameirakpam Bisheswar Singh met with Indian Maoist rebels in jail. Returning to Manipur, Bisheswar and his comrades Temba Singh and others went to China-occupied Tibet to receive training for 2 years. On returning in 1978, they formed the PLA modelled on the Chinese PLA and unleashed terror in the Valley. PLA formed its first political wing called Revolutionary People’s Front (RPF) in February 1979 with Bisheswar as Chairman. The UNLF and the PLA fought for socialism. They felt that their Maharaja had been tricked and forced to join India in 1949. With their distinct ethnic identity, many Manipuris felt they were not Indians. Independence and socialism, they felt, would restore their national pride. However, they suffered greater factionalism than their Naga and Mizo counterparts. In 1977, the PREPAK was formed, which in turn split into several factions. Kangleipak was the name of the independent socialist republic of Manipur. The KCP traced its origins to Irabot Singh’s heritage and raised armed units. On 8 September 1980, the entire state was declared a ‘disturbed area’ under the AFSPA. Military pressure and ideological disputes led to splits within the PLA and UNLF. Some surrendered and others were apprehended along with Bisheswar in August 1981. Bisheswar was elected in local elections in 1985 and was released from jail

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to become a politician. He was killed by his erstwhile comrades in August 1994. Temba, leader of the strongest splinter group of the PLA, went to China but his political turn towards trade-oriented policies under Deng Xiaoping was not useful to the rebels. Temba found a link with the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) in Myanmar. Establishing contact with the Kachins, he and his group went for training and returned to Manipur in 1986 with some weapons. The KIA was convenient proxy for the Chinese military intelligence. China by then was less keen to fight the Indian government but more interested in collecting intelligence on the border areas. The Kachin rebels achieved peace with the Burmese government in 1993 and all ‘foreign forces’ including militants from the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), were asked to leave KIA-controlled areas. But both ULFA and PLA established contact with the Chinese to obtain weapons. PLA groups already in Manipur attacked security forces and also took up ‘people-friendly’ issues: no alcohol, no drugs, and no rape. UNLF adopted the same tactics but in the early 1990s, it evolved into a formidable military force. In 1991, an armed wing called the Manipur People’s Army (MPA) was set up and guns were procured from sources in Pakistan and South East Asia smuggled through Burma and Bangladesh. MPA ambushed the security forces in the Loktak Hydroelectric Project area. On 31 August, 1995, a midnight raid on a Manipur Rifles outpost near Imphal resulted in the seizure of a large quantity of arms and ammunitions. Raids were also conducted in Churachandpur, Thoubal and other places. The UNLF conducted ‘Social Reformation Campaigns’ and claimed to have shot dead more than fifty rapists in the 1990s. The security forces were accused of heavy-handed methods (HRW, 2008: 38). The violence went out of control and on 10 June 2000, unidentified gunmen shot dead UNLF’s founder Arambam Samarendra, who was a leading literary figure and social activist. The state was heading for chaos. The people of Myanmar turned against the military regime but thousands of former insurgents rallied behind the regime given the lucrative

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business opportunities and unofficial permission to run drugs with impunity, since the only main road between India and Myanmar crosses the border from Moreh in Manipur to Tamu on the opposite side in Burma. Thus, Manipur was soon awash with drugs from the Golden Triangle. Many were HIV-positive. In March 1999, drug traffickers had reportedly opened up new routes in opium and heroin trafficking from Myanmar to the Indian border states of Manipur, Mizoram and Nagaland.

Human rights violations: a special report In 1939–40, the AR had been used to put down the initial rioting of the ‘Second Women’s War’ (‘Nupilan’). During the brief period of independence between 1947 and 1949, the chief minister of the state requested the deployment of the same force to contain his political opponents. After merger in 1949, regular army units were stationed in Manipur allegedly to protect the border from external communist aggression. From the beginning of the twentieth century, military and paramilitary forces have clearly been used in Manipur to control the civilian population. This militarization of law and order compromised the role of civil police. Since 1958, the imposition of AFSPA has further marginalized civil police authority. It is unhealthy for the armed forces to be tied up with control of civilian population rather than dealing with external enemies. The beginning of a period of arbitrary arrests and police brutality in Manipur may be traced back to the September 1948 incident at Pundongbam in which the police attacked a gathering of the peasant organization, ‘Krishak Sangha’ led by Irabot Singh. The demand for a public enquiry into the incident was ignored; a large number of Irabot’s supporters, women and men were arrested, beaten up and jailed. Irabot was forced to go into hiding. The democratically elected state government of Manipur endured less than a year and by 15 October 1949 Manipur had become part of the Indian Union. A new Indian Chief Commissioner had assumed complete control of the administration.

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Irabot Singh yielded to public pressure and advocated overtly Marxist policies from his underground headquarters. A military wing of the movement, Red Guard, started training in guerrilla tactics in late 1940s and early 1950s. Thus began the Meitei insurgency movement which has continued to the present day pressing for autonomy or complete independence. Irabot himself did not live to see these developments. On a visit to Myanmar, he died of typhoid on 26 September 1951. After merger with India, control of the Manipur police passed into the hands of officials brought from outside the state. The force further alienated itself by recruiting large number of Nepalis and Indian ex-soldiers. Given such history, it is not surprising that the police in Manipur are objects of suspicion. Its armed wing consisting of Manipur Police Commandos has become brutalized by counterinsurgency operations and are involved in a number of extrajudicial executions. The state armed police merged with Manipur Rifles in 1953. In addition, there are elite Manipur Police Commandos whose main function has been to deal with the insurgency. The senior officers of the armed wings are interchangeable. However, unlike military and paramilitary forces from outside the state, Manipur police can communicate with the people in the Manipuri language. Secondly, AFSPA, 1958 requires suspects arrested by the security forces to be produced at the police station at minimum delay. But AFSPA has resulted in the police having free hand with detainees. There have been serious cases of alleged police extra judicial executions (Sanajouba, 2000: 172). Reports of independent fact finding teams say that the civil police seldom take up complaints against security forces perhaps because of unwillingness to alienate the forces, which greatly outnumbers them. A fact-finding committee led by Justice Hosbet Suresh (2000) remarked, after referring to a case of random shooting by the CRPF (resulting in several deaths and injuries), that the ‘state has abdicated its power and functions in favour of an autocratic army’. The militarization of Manipur by the democratic Indian state has been well documented (Haksar and Hongray, 2011). Both

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military and paramilitary forces were brought into the state for counterinsurgency operations in the Hills but increasingly after the 1980s, in the Valley as well. The number of security forces fluctuates. A fact-finding committee in 2009 reported that the number of central and state paramilitary forces deployed in Manipur stood at sixty battalions. (See the report below on the Rabina and Sanjit Meitei case). These huge armed forces are required to control a population of less than three million and the number of insurgents according to official estimates did not exceed in mid-2000s, the figure of 6,000–7,000. The militarization of the state has serious consequences for the population. While the army is paid by the central government, there are, nevertheless, very considerable strains placed on the local economy, which already suffers from underfunding. The shortage of staple food and the constant inflation is partly due to the demands of the economically unproductive military. Furthermore, agricultural and economic life has been seriously disrupted by curfews, sweeps and general uncertainty. Petty restrictions are often imposed locally by the army at short notice without reference to the state government. The occupation of the historic palace complex, Kangla, until the end of 2004 by the AR has been felt as a source of humiliation. However, they fade into insignificance, besides the vastly more serious matter of civil rights abuse, perceived and actual, which the power given to the security forces has created. On the one hand, there are overt violations of basic human rights guaranteed under the Constitution but made legal by the AFSPA, 1958. On the other, at a more pervasive level, there is an overwhelming sense of unease and fearfulness which disrupts normal social and business life. The security forces are seen not as agents of security and peace but as agents of an oppressive psychological and physical pressure which makes normal human life all but impossible. Justice H Suresh in his report in 2000 stated: ‘In fact, wherever we went and to whomsoever we talked, all of them said that the army, CRPF, the AR should be withdrawn forthwith. We could perceive brooding uneasiness and feeling of uncertainty all-over Manipur’ (Parratt, 2005: 146).

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One of the many reasons why the security forces are seen in a poor light by the people is that there is an almost total lack of communication between them. Forces raised outside the state rarely have knowledge of the Manipuri language. Most of the rank and file do not have any understanding of English either. Too often the security forces have little education and have a narrow ethno-centrism which prevents them from appreciating the multiethnic nature of the Northeast. Further, paramilitary forces have very little training in dealing with civilians and more seriously, with civil unrest. They have been known to exhibit arrogance and lack of respect towards the common people and disregard for human rights. Imposition of forced labour and molestation of women including rapes and beatings are not uncommon. Their leadership has shown no willingness to acknowledge and deal with the abuses committed by their men.

AFSPA in Manipur The AFSPA has been described as a ‘truly nasty and terrifying legislation’ (Prabhakara, 2012: 228). The designation of the state as a ‘disturbed area’ under the AFSPA in 1980 has meant, in effect, that the state is subject to an undeclared emergency circumscribing not only the liberties of individual citizens but even limiting the freedom of the state government. Some state governors with military or police background and the officers who work under them have often acted against the interests of the state government and even accused it of inaction or collusion with insurgents. In effect, the state governments can exist only under uneasy subjection to a hostile centralized controlling authority. The same applies to the due process of law since security personnel are not subject to normal restraints and cannot be charged under civil law for any acts, however serious, claimed to have been carried out in the course of their duty under the AFSPA. AFSPA was formulated by British Raj in 1942 (see Chapter 4). In 1958, the Act of 1942 was revived and applied to the whole of Assam (then including Naga Hills, Lushai Hills

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and Meghalaya) and Manipur. At that time, due to the violent activities of the Naga underground, the Naga Hills and the Ukhrul district in Manipur were designated ‘disturbed’ under the AFSPA. The whole of Manipur was designated a ‘disturbed area’ in September 1980. The Act remained in force till 2004 when the government was forced to lift it in a small area of the Imphal municipality in the wake of the fake encounter killing of Thangjam Manorama by the AR and the protests that followed (see report below). The 1958 Act, amended in 1972, goes much further than the British legislation. Crucially, it replaced the term ‘emergency’ used in the 1942 Act with ‘disturbed areas’. Originally the status of disturbed area could only be declared by the state government concerned but in 1972 this power was also given to the central government. Further, while the 1942 Act gave the special powers granted by it only to those with the military rank of captain and above, the 1972 amendment extended this to ‘any commissioned officer, warrant officer, non-commissioned officer or any equivalent rank’, in other words to anyone but the humblest private. These powers were also given to the paramilitary and the armed police (see Appendix II for the Act of 1958 as amended in 1972). Despite the serious implications of the Act, it was rushed through the parliament with minimum discussion. When in 1980, the act was extended to the whole of Manipur, there were large protests and rallies by voluntary groups and other bodies, including ‘Nupi Kanglup’, a women’s group (Phanjoubam, 1993: 82). Several women were killed and injured by security force actions. The imposition of the Act had the effect of increasing the violent attacks of underground groups against the security forces. Recorded attacks on them rose by 50 per cent from seventy-seven in 1980 to 118 in the next year. The AFSPA has been characterized as a ‘national security tyranny’ (SAHRDC, 1995; see also Chapter 4) since it violates both the Indian Constitution and the international conventions and instruments to which India is a signatory. Significantly, the terminology employed in the Act is defined according to the usage in the Army Act of 1950. The definition of the concept of

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‘disturbed area’ is vague, requiring only that the central or state governments should be of the ‘opinion that the whole or parts of the area are in a dangerous or disturbed condition such that the use of the armed forces in aid of civil powers is necessary’. After the July 1987 Oinam atrocities by the AR in the Ukhrul district (Haksar and Hongray, 2011: 23), the Naga People’s Movement for Human Rights filed petitions against the AR in the Guwahati High Court, which directed that the detainees should be released but no action could be taken against the paramilitary personnel responsible. However, intimidation of witnesses is routine and there is often heavy uniformed paramilitary presence at court hearings. Essentially, the military and paramilitaries can only be tried by court martial, which are entirely in the hands of the commanding officers, are not public and findings are not published. In effect, the security forces who are charged with enforcing law and order and ensuring peace, are above the law and entirely unaccountable. Interesting in this connection is the story of the MHRC. The Commission was set up in June 1998 to implement the provisions of the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993 enacted by the Parliament of India. It began functioning from December 1998 and took up numerous cases of human rights violations resulting from Manipur’s decades-long history of conflict, including fake encounters, forced disappearances, custodial deaths, rape, torture and assault. It made a conscious attempt at a paradigm shift in the human rights discourse in Manipur. There are hundreds of poor, downtrodden, marginalized people in the state and due to their ignorance, economic deprivation and/or lack of adequate resources they are incapable of accessing the courts for redress of grievances. By giving space to them the MHRC tried to make public servants accountable. After the expiry of its 5-year term in 2003 there was considerable delay on the part of the state government in reconstituting the Commission. Upon a public interest litigation filed in 2005, the Guwahati High Court directed the state government to reconstitute the Commission and it was indeed reconstituted in May 2005. Another 5-year term ended in May 2010 but the

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Commission was not reconstituted. A further order was issued by the Guwahati High Court to the state government that the Commission be reconstituted within four months from the date of issue of its order on 19 February 2012 but no action has been taken by the government of Manipur till April 2012. Significantly neither, the MHRC nor the NHRC has powers to make legally binding recommendations. Thus, no mechanism for prosecution of security forces personnel is available to civilian victims of human rights violations. In effect, there obtains, under AFSPA1958 in Manipur, a situation in which structures are in place which legally permit the violent abuse and killing of civilians by those agencies – the army, the paramilitaries and the police – whose mandate should be to preserve the law, order and justice (Parratt, 2005: 165). In practical terms, the AFSPA, 1958 has been a failure. An act presented to Parliament in 1958 as a short-term measure for a limited geographical area has been in force for more than half a century. Far from solving the problem of insurgency, it has exacerbated armed non-state violence. It has cost the nation a huge sum of money which could have been better spent on poverty alleviation. The militarization of the region has come in the way of internal and external investment. The social cost in terms of lives lost and persons physically and psychologically damaged has been huge. The impact on the relations between the states of the Northeast and the Centre has been significant. Many people in the region hold that they have been singled out for special punishment. This is widely perceived as indicative of a racist, neocolonial bias against India’s Northeast leading to suppression of identity by force of arms. The Malom massacre by the AR on 2 November 2000 led to the launching of an indefinite fast of Ms Irom Sharmila for the removal of the AFSPA from Manipur. We examine below two important cases of human rights violations in Manipur in 2004 and 2009 made possible by the existence of a law such as the AFSPA. In the first case the AR was directly involved and in the second the state police commandos functioned with impunity

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made possible by the AFSPA. The second report provides a graphic picture of the contemporaneous situation in Manipur.

The Thangjam Manorama case, 2004 The rape and murder of the Manipuri woman Ms Thangjam Manorama in 2004 by AR personnel was a blatant case of human rights violation in Manipur. The state witnessed a number of cases of unaccounted killings by the AR in early 2004, which climaxed in the killing of the young Ms Manorama in July 2004 in circumstances which brought into sharp focus the structures of abuse made possible by the AFSPA imposed on Manipur in September, 1980. Shortly after midnight on 11 July 2004, a team of 17 AR men broke into house of the late Bihari Singh in Bamon Kampu in Imphal looking for Ms Manorama. Her elderly mother and brother were severely beaten up and Manorama was dragged out of the house. The family was prevented from following her. Manorama was tied up and subjected to brutal interrogation, which included gagging and throttling by pouring water over the face, knife cuts and beating. Her brothers were told she was being taken to the AR Headquarters for further interrogation. The arrest memo signed by Havildar Suresh Kumar and Riflemen Ajit Singh and T Lotha, clearly specified that no property had been seized at the time of arrest. Later in the morning the dead body of Manorama was found near Ngaria Mapan Maring village. The subsequent inquest showed that the body had five bullet wounds, one of which had penetrated the genitals from the back, severe bruising (including the breasts) and deep cuts to the thighs and back. Evidence of semen stains on the clothing, discovered at a subsequent forensic examination in Kolkata revealed sexual assault. AR stated that she had agreed to take them to a cache of weapons, had dismounted from the truck on pretext of relieving herself and been shot trying to escape. The forensic evidence showed a small amount of blood at the place where her body was recovered indicating that she had been shot elsewhere. Death in custody is common in Manipur

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but the Manorama case was so blatant that it caused an immediate public uproar. When the torture, sexual assault and extra-judicial execution became evident, the AR issued a public statement that Manorama was a ‘baby-faced killer’ and a cadre of the PLA. It charged her with killing of security personnel and civilians and for bomb blasts. It asserted (contrary to the arrest memo) that she had carried a radio set, hand grenade and an AK 47 rifle plus incriminating documents. No evidence was offered for these assertions. Public protest escalated. Political bodies, women’s groups, civil, voluntary organizations and student bodies voiced outrage. Eminent artists, academics, writers and sportspersons demanded action. On the morning of 15 July 2004, a group of women gathered at the gates of the Kangla, the 17 AR HQ and dramatically stripped themselves naked in protest at the rape and murder of Manorama. An immediate curfew was imposed on greater Imphal. The dramatic naked protest by the courageous women of Imphal caught international attention (Parratt, 2005: 230). Historian Ananya Vajpeyi describes the women’s naked protest in Imphal against the AR and the AFSPA as ‘life stripped naked of the civility and strengths of democracy’ (Vajpeyi in Baruah, 2009: 41). The state government announced a judicial inquiry under Judge Upendra Singh. On 16 July 2004 there were chaotic scenes in Imphal including arson and destruction of property. The demand for the removal of AFSPA increased. Public feelings were not assuaged. Special central paramilitary police forces were brought into the state from outside. An Army General announced that a court of inquiry was being set up on the case though there were doubts that it would really do something. A defence ministry spokesman reiterated the charge that Manorama was a PLA cadre and that there had been no rape of Manorama as claimed. The DG of the AR repeated the charge of Manorama being linked to the underground and asserting that postmortem had disproved the allegation of rape. This statement further enraged the public. Despite this, however, postmortems, done twice by separate sets of doctors, of Manorama’s

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body confirmed eight gunshots all of them at very close range. The doctors said some of the shots were fired while the victim was lying on the ground with her face down with the assailants standing over her. Three of these gunshots were aimed at her genitals mutilating them beyond medical examination for rape. Forensic examinations of the body emphatically refuted the assertion of the AR that the young woman was shot while running away from their custody. Close range multiple shots at the genitals lent credence to the rape and murder theory. A minister in the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India who visited Manipur, promised to avoid future human rights abuse, ensure presence of policewomen during counter insurgency operations and so on but avoided responding to the public demand for the repeal of the AFSPA. He, however, promised that the AR would be removed from its Kangla palace headquarters. Protest rallies continued unabated with persistent demands for the removal of the AFSPA and the police reaction became increasingly high-handed. After much hullabaloo the state chief minister announced that the Act will be lifted from the Imphal municipal area but not from the whole state. While denouncing the atrocities committed under the Act the state chief minister emphasized that the state police would continue to act against underground antinational elements. Political leaders issued statements asking the Prime Minister to initiate a dialogue to find a solution to the problems. The Union Home Minister announced that he was ready to hold talks with the insurgents. A massive mobilization of central paramilitary and state police forces and commandos went on as if in preparation for a massive operation. The cost in transport alone for these forces was huge. In addition, prolific expenditure on tear gas and rubber bullets, etc meant that further supplies had to be brought from New Delhi at a huge cost. Women’s organizations became increasingly belligerent. The Union government announced a massive financial package for development in the state. A Special Officer was appointed to advice the central government on Manipur. The war on insurgency was not let up. A Unified Command under the chief minister and a Strategic

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Operations Group (SOG) were organized. Military operations against the PLA and the UNLF were stepped up. ‘Operation All Clear’ was launched in the Churachandpur district and on the Myanmar border and the Myanmar military government agreed to seal its borders with Manipur. Satellite mapping was used to pinpoint insurgent bases and usable roads. Army activity around Jiribam increased. The military requisitioned civilian vehicles without payment and resorted to forced labour. By the end of 2004, it was reported that the security forces in Manipur numbered 40,000 (total population: about 2.7 million).

The Rabina Devi and Sanjit Meitei case, 2009 The political situation in Manipur became explosive following a fake gun battle and extra-judicial killings by the Manipur Police Commandos of two innocents – the pregnant Rabina Devi (23) and the young ex-militant Sanjit Meitei (25) – on 23 July 2009 at the crowded Khwairamband market area in Imphal. A fact-finding team of civil rights activists visited the state from 5–10 November 2009 and assessed the human rights violations in the state (DSG, 2009). The team consisted of four eminent human rights activists from New Delhi. The team met a group of concerned senior citizens who blamed the central government for its inaction. They identified two major conflicts, which have persisted in the state ever since its merger in October 1949: a ‘vertical’ conflict with the Government of India and a ‘horizontal’ conflict with the Nagas people in the borderlands seeking integration of Naga-inhabited areas of Manipur with the proposed ‘greater Nagaland’ or ‘Nagalim’. The ‘vertical conflict’ arose from the deceitful methods of the Indian government in forcibly integrating the independent state of Manipur into India in 1949. This episode rankled with sections of Manipuris who resorted to armed militant action for independence. The elders said this conflict could only be resolved by sustained tripartite negotiations between the Centre, the armed militants and civil society elders with no political affiliations.

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The ‘horizontal conflict’ arising from the demand for the partition of the state by a section of the Nagas in the state could be resolved by the Centre by suitably amending Article 3 of the Constitution of India to guarantee the geographical integrity of Manipur. The senior citizens identified rampant corruption and nepotism on the part of the ruling elite as a major problem. Desperate to deal with the public unrest, the authorities in Manipur called for the resumption of classes in educational institutions which had been boycotted by the angry people. But this required prior negotiations between the people and the government. If the impasse remained, the central government would need to intervene. Members of the public met by the fact-finding team felt that the Centre should impose President’s Rule in Manipur to bring peace. The fact-finding team met and interacted with the families of those killed in the fake encounters by the state police commandos. Harrowing tales of human rights violations were narrated. Women whose husbands/sole breadwinners had been killed narrated their woes from the absence of their husbands whose limited earnings were the only support of their families. They demanded justice as well as income-earning opportunities to support themselves and their children. The women also demanded the resignation of the chief minister on moral grounds and the dismissal of the state Director General of Police (DGP) for gross dereliction of duty in allowing fake encounters by his subordinates. At a meeting with the chief minister and the state DGP, the team was told that it would not be possible for the government to provide employment opportunities to the families of all those killed since the numbers were large. The demand for the resignation of the chief minister and the dismissal of the state DGP were also not accepted. The DGP informed the visiting team that about 260 people had been executed by the police since January 2006 as they were ‘underground militants/activists’. When the team expressed concern over the detention of the eminent human rights activist Jiten Yumnam, the DGP justified it stating that he was found to

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have connections with the ‘underground militants’. The chief minister stated that he was ready to have a second round of discussions with those agitating over the violent incidents though several of their demands could not be met. He added that the repeal of the AFSPA was a matter for the central government. The team called for the transparent investigation of all cases registered under the law. Cases of extra-judicial executions should be transparently investigated and the guilty punished. The team learnt that about 150 persons were held in the state prison as detainees under security legislations. The team interacted with some of the former detainees. The team met Ms Irom Sharmila then in the tenth year of her fast demanding repeal of the AFSPA. It called upon the government to provide similar access to other civil society members and family members on a regular basis. Being allowed only a limited number of visitors, Sharmila expressed her desire to meet, see and speak to more people. Her strength and courage in undertaking the longest ‘satyagraha’ in the world in a nonviolent way was impressive. She expressed concern over the number of innocents that were dying every day in Manipur due to the high levels of violence. In discussions in Imphal, the team came across repeated allegations against the security forces. The team expressed its deep concern over the deteriorating situation and the prevailing climate of impunity in Manipur. It called for adequate recompense to the hapless women. Many of the killings were ‘fake encounters’, that is, killings of innocents who perished either in custody or otherwise, but without legal sanction. Each of these cases called for transparent investigation and punishment of the guilty. Further, there were many charges on the use of preventive detention laws to curb citizens’ democratic rights to protest and freely express their views. The high degree and frequency of violation of human rights in the state was a cause for alarm. Restoration of peace and order had to go hand in hand with the promotion of the rule of law and justice for the sustenance of democracy. Official sources revealed following information about the police manpower deployed in the state as of 1 November 2009:

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Manipur Rifles (MR) and India Reserve Battalions (IRB): 10,396 (six battalions each); other civil police units: 5,056; CAPFs (CRPF and BSF): 10, 450 (six battalions each); Army/ AR: ten battalions and twenty-six battalions respectively; it was reported that these forces were meant for the entire region; Home Guards: 2,312. It was noticed that Manipur, with a population of less than 3 million, had too many military, paramilitary forces (about 60,000) and too few civilian police forces (about 5,000). The basic purpose of policing, namely service delivery to the public, was downgraded at the cost of maintenance of public order; the number of cases registered per year (including normal crime and extraordinary crime) was not large and the rate of conviction was poor. Both these features were disturbing. The fact-finding team traced the sequence of events in the violent incidents in July 2009: On 23 July 2009 forenoon, the Manipur police commandos during frisking operations on the arterial Khwairamband Road held a young man, allegedly with a firearm but he escaped from police custody. While chasing him, the commandos resorted to indiscriminate firing. A stray bullet from an automatic weapon hit and killed 23-year-old pregnant woman, Rabina. Police commandos were discomfited by this unplanned killing and started looking for a scapegoat for the killing. They located the ex-militant Sanjit who was doing medical shopping for his ailing relative. The commandos caught Sanjit, dragged him to a nearby pharmacy cum watch-repair shop, shot him dead at point blank range and planted a weapon on him to make it appear that he was responsible for shooting and killing young Rabina. Both the bodies were then placed in a truck and taken away. The police then put out the story that Sanjit, the ex-militant, had killed Rabina. However, the photographs published contemporaneously in the ‘Tehelka’ magazine, New Delhi (Volume 6, Issue No. 31, dated 8 August 2009), told a different story disproving the police version. The two violent killings by the police commandos and the police explanation were not credible. There was public outrage and demonstrations. At his meeting with the fact-finding team,

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the state police chief maintained that Sanjit was a hardened militant and that the ‘Tehelka’ magazine photos were fabricated. The armed conflict between the Indian state and non-state actors in Manipur has been a long-standing affair. The Indian state tends to view the conflict as ‘internal disturbances’, which justified the large-scale deployment of armed forces and central paramilitary police forces and the imposition of the AFSPA (see full text in Appendix II). The AFSPA has been in force in Manipur since September 1980. However, following the fake encounter killing of Thangjam Manorama in July 2004, some municipal areas of Imphal had been freed from the operation of the Act. The place of occurrence of the incidents on 23 July 2009 was excluded from the operation of the Act. Further, Manipur police commandos are not protected under the provisions of the AFSPA. The Act provides wide powers to the armed forces of the Indian Union, including the power to shoot on suspicion in an area declared as a ‘disturbed area’ under its provisions. No legal action can be initiated against the armed forces for misusing the law without the prior approval of the Government of India. The team noted that with the prolonged imposition of the AFSPA, the cycle of violence has spread geographically and in intensity. Enforced disappearances, arbitrary executions, torture, rape, housebreak, loot, arbitrary detention etc. have become everyday features of life in Manipur. And yet, few perpetrators of these gross violations of human rights were ever prosecuted. Thus, the armed forces enjoy complete impunity and immunity under the Act. The imposition of the Act and the resulting human rights violations contributed to the growth of numerous militant groups rather than help contain insurgency. Police records showed that there were more than thirty-eight militant underground outfits operating in the state. Many of these groups had factions too difficult to distinguish from one another. Their brand of revolution based on extortion,

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kidnapping for ransom, kangaroo courts and summary executions, bomb blasts and terror tactics had led to increasing discontent among the general public directed at non-state actors. The previously vocal civil society organizations were immobilized by the state government with charges of siding with the banned organizations. This situation gave unofficial sanction for elimination of any suspect and a killing spree by the police. In 2008 alone, the state witnessed the killing of more than 285 ‘suspects’ by the security forces. Many of these cases remained unexplained. Families of victims or eyewitnesses said that the deceased ‘suspects’ were first arrested, then taken to another place and then brutally murdered. Thus, domestic laws and international human rights standards were routinely flouted by state agencies. Respect for the law on conflict and the basic tenets of international humanitarian law were ignored by both state agencies and non-state ones. The fact-finding team, using data collected from newspaper and other reliable reports made an assessment of the situation in Manipur in 2009. The underground movement for independence of Manipur had begun in 1964 with the founding of the United National Liberation Front (UNLF). Other militant outfits followed in the late-1970s: primarily, the Revolutionary Peoples Front and its armed wing PLA, 1978; PREPAK, 1977; ‘Kangleipak’ (original name of the state) Communist Party (KCP), 1980; and the Kanglei Yaol Kanba Lup (KYKL), 1994. In the Hills, there are Naga underground militant outfits: National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah): National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Khaplang); and Kuki outfits such as the KNO and its armed wing Kuki National Army (KNA); Kuki National Front (KNF); Kuki Revolutionary Army (KRA); Kuki Liberation Organization and its armed wing the Kuki Liberation Army (KLA) and others. The tremors of the movement for independence in neighbouring Nagaland spread to the Naga-inhabited districts of Senapati and Ukhrul in Manipur. As the state forces failed to contain the movement, the army was called in. To facilitate army operations,

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a legal framework was introduced in the shape of the AFSPA. The Act is a direct descendant of the Armed Forces Special Powers Ordinance 1942 used by the British during the Second World War to suppress the Indian freedom struggle. The present Act is more draconian but applicable only in distinct geographical regions declared ‘disturbed areas’ under the Act. With modifications, the 1958 Act was harsher than its predecessor Ordinance of 1942. Initially, parts of Manipur were declared ‘disturbed areas’. In 1980, the whole state was declared a ‘disturbed area’ under the Act of 1958. With the continuation of the Act, the cycle of violence has grown in geographical spread and in intensity. Enforced disappearances, arbitrary executions, torture, rape and molestation, housebreaking, looting, arbitrary detention etc. have become a part of everyday life in Manipur. And yet, few violators of human rights are brought to justice. For all practical purposes, the armed forces enjoy complete immunity under the Act. An international human rights agency in 2008 documented the failure of justice in Manipur under the AFSPA. The agency noted that ‘security forces are bypassing the law and killing people on suspicion that they are militants instead of bringing them before a judge. In the name of national security and armed forces morale, the state protects abusers and leaves Manipuris with no remedy to secure justice’. Though the operation of the Act was eventually withdrawn from certain municipal areas in Imphal, the state police commandos operating along with paramilitary forces had continued the killing of suspects taking advantage of the immunity provided to the central armed forces in it. Focusing only on the so-called encounters between state forces and suspected and banned underground militant groups in 2008, the emerging pattern was one of escalation in the number of questionable killings in the state. The distinctive features in the so-called police encounters killings were as follows: isolated locations; absence of casualties on the part of security forces; recovery of 9 mm pistol or hand grenades in most cases; combination of force

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from the police commandos units and central security forces including AR; the slain victim being taken away from home and killed at another place; theft of money, mobile phones and other valuables from the victims; and so on. In most of these cases, the local ‘meira paibis’ (‘women torch bearers’) and villagers in the vicinity of the place of occurrence said that either the victims were brought there and killed or were already dead and dumped there after firing some shots in the air. There were many instances of protest by the local inhabitants against bringing and shooting of detainees at such spots. There were even instances of confrontation between the local ‘meira paibis’ and the security forces over bringing and shooting detainees at such locations. The young Manipuri woman Ms Sharmila had been on a Gandhian indefinite hunger strike for the previous last 12 years demanding the repeal of the AFSPA. She had been officially kept alive through forcible nasal feeding. She was charged with attempted suicide under the Indian Penal Code. In all the killings, the police or security forces did not suffer any casualties. In most of them, they claimed resorting to retaliatory firing and in some cases, even claimed recovery of empty cases or fired cartridges. The majority of the recoveries made from the sites of encounters were 9 mm pistols and hand grenades. Even if claims were made by bereaved families that the victims were innocent, recoveries of the weapons were made. Such weapons were often carried by the security forces so as to plant them on victims when needed. Case studies showed that the security forces involved in many cases were combined teams of the Manipur police Commandos and army/paramilitary forces including the AR. After 1972, seven state governments had come up in the region. Under the AFSPA, the central armed forces and paramilitary units were provided immunity from penalty for their acts. However, the sense of not having to answer for their actions has percolated down to the state forces as well to such an extent that the Manipur police commandos freely killed people without fearing

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consequences. They had become a State-sponsored terrorist group. In Manipur, the civil policemen and officers were selected and trained as Commandos. They soon deteriorated due to poor leadership and started extorting money from the business community, following the trend set by the insurgents. The underground outfits extorted money from the traders and elements of the special police forces too did the same thing (Rammohan, 2011: 132). Case studies revealed the Manipur police commandos acting independently and carrying out ‘encounters’ without the assistance of the army or paramilitary forces. The state government remained a mute spectator to such killings and to the protests that followed. Thus, the state security forces enjoyed the same immunity as the central armed forces. Indeed, the number of killings of ‘suspects’ by the police were considered as ‘achievements’ and the perpetrators rewarded with cash incentives and gallantry medals and provided accelerated promotions. The audacity of the state government in doling out such incentives fuelled the security forces further to even more atrocious killings. Case studies in 2008 revealed that places of occurrence of the ‘encounters’ differed from the ones claimed by the police. The victims were often picked up from their residences or locality followed by police claims that they had been killed in ‘encounters’. In many cases, the local women activists claimed that the victims were either brought and shot in particular places or were brought dead and left. In one case, the leaders of nineteen villages held a public meeting to protest against the ‘fake encounters’. In other instances, women activists protested against such actions by the security forces and even staged physical combats with them. Security forces often recovered large sums of money from the person of the victims. Family members reported that the victims had left home with a large sum of money. This was not reflected in the recovery memos submitted by the security forces. Recoveries of incriminating pistols and grenades were always made in

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the aftermath of alleged encounters but recoveries of money were never recorded by the security forces. Financial gain appeared to have played a key role in the killing of the victims. The people of the state felt extremely insecure in carrying large amounts of cash on their person. Police recruitments in Manipur were a huge scandal. The recruitment processes appeared transparent but there was always the smell of corruption. After recruitment was a clamour for coveted postings, which offered avenues for making money by various methods including ‘encounter’ killings of alleged militants. ‘Devotion and dedication’ to duty was important for the police commandos. They were concerned about meeting personal agendas rather than professional ones. In one case, the state security forces abducted the son of the chief engineer of a department along with his two friends, robbed them of their belongings such as their laptops, mobile phones and money. They were only released after a promise to pay a huge ransom. The situation had come to such a pass that people were being eliminated even for gaining smaller sums of money. The promised ‘relief’ to victim families was often not paid by the state government. Though fact-finding bodies were set up to look into such cases their reports were never published. Departmental inquiries against corrupt officials never reached any conclusion. The custom of ‘mankad’ in the Hill areas of the state was effectively used by the security forces to achieve peace after the commission of grave, punishable offences. The practice was that when someone violated a tradition of a particular tribal community, the practice of ‘mankad’ often allowed the ‘wrong’ to be ‘righted’ by the offering of an elaborate feast to the members of the offended village community by the offending party along with a negotiated sum of money to be paid as compensation. The security forces, especially the army authorities, had learnt to take advantage of this custom of offering ‘mankad’ when faced with charges of extra-judicial killings. In this way, protests against human rights violations are silenced. Cases of arbitrary detention and torture are routine in Manipur. In almost all these cases denial is the key word in

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the lexicon of the security forces. The claims of the victims are silenced with fear of reprisals or they are left to persist with their own versions and any protest or agitation is ignored by the authorities to be forgotten in due course. Finally, the failure of the Government of India to take any action on the recommendation of the Jeevan Reddy Committee to repeal AFSPA elicited frequent adverse comment in the media. It was noted that the Government of India had not only ignored the pleas of ordinary Manipuris and UN human rights bodies to repeal the AFSPA, but had also ignored the findings of its own fact-finding body. This reflected the sort of callousness that bred anger, hate and more violence.

Chapter 3

A Tripura case study

This chapter examines the conflict dynamics in the former princely state of Tripura, which is marked by a basic tribal–nontribal confrontation. Following the Partition of 1947, the huge influx of a predominantly Hindu population from neighbouring Bangladesh across a porous border into Tripura converted this mainly tribal state into a predominantly nontribal state. In sharp contrast to Manipur, there was no opposition in Tripura to its integration with India in 1949. Again in contrast to Manipur which is marked by multiple ethnicities and insurgencies, the major conflicts in Tripura have been led by the ethnic Reangs (1943–45) and by the ethnic Tripuris who spearheaded agrarian revolt (1948–51) against loss of lands to the immigrant nontribals. While the Reang Rebellion was suppressed, the Tripuri tribal resistance continued in different forms. The CPI played a significant role in the agrarian revolt of 1948–51. The dynamics of the conflict situation in the state was shaped by a three-way political contestation between the communists, the Congress and some of the leading tribal political organizations. Though the conflicts have become subdued in the recent period, the state government continues to rely on the Assam Rifles (AR), Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) and the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act 1958 (AFSPA) to maintain peace indicating thereby some uncertainty about the future of the conflict scenario. The former princely state of Tripura is one of the smaller states of India: a hilly, landlocked territory with diverse topography, people, flora and fauna and altitudes range from 15 to 940 metres. A majority of the population lives in the plains. With a

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tropical weather and receiving heavy rainfall during monsoon, the state is surrounded on the north, west and south by Bangladesh and is accessible to the rest of India by surface transport via Assam and Mizoram. The international border with Bangladesh is 856 km long (84 per cent of the total length) and the national border with Assam of 53 km and Mizoram of 109 km. The state stretches about 184 km from north to south and 113 km from east to west (GOT, Annual Plan, 2011–12). The state merged with the India on 15 October 1949. It became a state of the Indian Union on 21 January 1971 with sixty seats in the state assembly. It has twenty-three subdivisions, forty-five development blocks and one Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TAADC) under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. The TAADC covers about two-thirds of the total land area and has one-third of the total population of 3.7 million (Census, 2011). With an area of about 10,500 sq.km, Tripura is the second most populated state in the Northeast after Assam. The originally tribal majority Tripura witnessed large-scale migration from Bangladesh into the plains mostly consisting of Hindus and Muslims across a porous international border. The Hindu majority today constitutes the major segment. The rest of the population of about 31 per cent of the total, are indigenous tribal people belonging to about 19 ethnic communities (mainly Tripuri, Reang, Jamatia, Chakma, Mog and Naotia) who live mainly in the hills. The decline of tribal population took place during the period from 1864 to 2001 (Vohra, 2011: 34). A sharper decline was during 1941–71 from 50.09 to 28.95 per cent. Though the state population grew twenty times from 1901 to 2001, the availability of cultivable land remained static with much of it passing into the hands of the migrant Bengalis both legally and illegally. The demographic and rehabilitation issues, which are the major cause of the conflict in the state, did not receive serious attention. While the majority population is Hindu, Muslims (8 per cent), Buddhists (3.1 per cent) and Christians (3.2 per cent) also inhabit the state. The dominant culture is Bengali. Princely Tripura came under indirect British influence with a Political Agent appointed in 1871. Bengali became the official

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language though the tribal population spoke Kokborok. Tribal king Bir Bikram died in 1947 at the time of Partition when his son Kirit Bikram was still a minor. The influx of refugees during and after Partition caused havoc and produced a reaction among the local Muslims and tribal people. The tribal militant organization ‘Sengkrak’ (‘Clenched Fist’) emerged in the 1960s and resorted to violence against the migrant Bengalis. The Muslim reaction consisted of a failed attempt to integrate the state with East Pakistan after Partition. Maharani Kanchanprabha Devi, however, hastily obtained integration with India signing a merger agreement on behalf of the minor king Kirit Bikram. A multiparty political system with several political parties and regular elections operates in Tripura. People’s participation in elections increased steadily over the years since independence with more development leading to greater participation. Compared to princely times, major changes took place in the development of Tripura. An electorate of 47.10 per cent took part in the 1952 election which rose to 81.73 per cent in the 1983 election (Gan-Chaudhuri, 1985: 71). The Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) under the 73rd Amendment of the Constitution in 1993 replaced the traditional panchayat system. In 1985, the TAADC under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution came into existence. The undivided CPI was dominant in the politics of Tripura from 1945 to 1955 and the Indian National Congress (INC) from 1956 to 1975. From 1976 to 1985, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) became dominant. From 1993 to the present, successive Left Front governments led by the Communist Party of India, Marxist (CPIM) have dominated the political scene. The Partition in 1947 meant a huge social, economic and infrastructural setback for Tripura. The state was cut off from the rest of India but for a tenuous road link. The heavy influx of refugees from East Pakistan from the early 1950s created tremendous pressure on the already over-burdened land. Further migration after the 1971 Bangladesh war, swelled the population. Before Partition, the distance from Agartala to

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Kolkata was less than 350 km. After Partition, the route via the Siliguri land corridor became 1,700 km long!

Reang Rebellion, 1943–45 The traditional and hereditary features of the princely regime of Tripura exhibited the manifold gradations of authority of a feudal state as noted by British Political Agents. The masses looked to their Maharaja with ‘a mixture of superstition and indifference’ (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 33). The royal chronicle, the ‘Sri Rajmala’, claims that the Tripura tribal kingdom came into existence in the fifteenth century (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 32). The state was then sparsely populated with a static political structure. Tripura witnessed the emergence of features of the Bengal administrative and legal systems and control over resources. The process was bureaucratic and had no popular backing. In 1907, the police administration was reorganized and separated from the revenue administration. The judicial system underwent change with a hierarchy of courts. The Tripura civil service was established in 1916, with a chief secretary. The Indian Penal Code, 1861 was also introduced. The attempt by the government in 1941 to set up village councils in place of the traditional tribal self-governing institutions met with resistance among the Reangs, the second largest tribal community after the Tripuris. They protested against the unfair taxation and the discontent led to the Reang Rebellion of 1943–45. Despite efforts of modernization, the feudal regime remained intact with no unified or coherent political structure. The state had no standing army and no effective police system. To deal with the Reang Rebellion, the Maharaja’s bodyguards were deployed in addition to the Rajya Rakhi Vahini, a temporary volunteer force. The Tripura Rifles, established during the Second World War, though disbanded later, provided thousands of young men to the Gana Mukti Parishad (GMP), a tribal outfit, during the communist-led armed struggle (1948–51). The urbanized, microscopic changes in the administration lacked dynamism. Passivity was the hallmark of government.

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The Political Agent, HJ Todd, remarked: ‘my chief impression is one of stagnation. This is apparent on all sides and in all branches of the administration due to inertia at the top. The ruler takes little confirmed interest in anything. And the chief minister’s guiding principle is to do nothing’ (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 34). Tripura had ‘one of the most ramshackle administrations in India’, attributable to its isolation, lack of communication and underdevelopment. He added that it should be ‘one of the earliest in India for political agitators to topple over’ (Ibid.: 34). The limited ‘modernization’ of Tripura established the dominance of job-seeking middle class from Bengal (described as ‘surplus Bhadralok’) who were used by the princely rulers to run the administration. The British noted in 1909 that the King’s officials were mainly Bengali natives, ‘graduates of the Calcutta University’, although certain offices were held exclusively by the thakurs who were connected with the royal family by ‘marriage or otherwise’. Aghore Debbarma, a tribal communist leader complained in the 1940s that since the top echelons of the administration were filled by Bengalis, the educated but unemployed tribal youth had to go to Bengal to seek jobs, if available! Tripuri nationalists perceived that a new community of upper caste Hindus had gradually risen to power and position in the state. Almost all officials down to the peon in the state were members of the upper caste Bengali Hindu community. All the banks, tea gardens and large commercial enterprises were owned by them (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 35). This created a deep sense of deprivation among the indigenous tribal youths, which was at the root of discontent in the 1940s. The princely regime witnessed the ascendancy of the Bengalis, who tied to the monarchy by patronage and privilege, wielded real power. The princely regime, though nonhegemonic, was autocratic and repressive. The Tripura monarchs belonged to the dominant Tripuri tribe and owned all the lands. The peasants had no right to the lands they tilled and they had no civil rights.

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Tribal unrest The second half of the nineteenth century in Tripura was dominated by tribal unrest. Nabin Chandra Sen, a subdivisional officer at Feni during the British raj, noted that severe repression by the ‘waterfowls’ (officials and landed gentry) was the rule in tax collection (Sen, 1959: 443). In princely Tripura the punishment for felling a tree without the ruler’s permission could amount to execution (Chakraborty, 1952: 29). The ethnic Tripuri rulers were patrons of Bengali-Hindu culture and considered it the model of modernization. The term ‘upajati’ was used to denote tribespeople implying inferior status. King Bir Chandra Manikya (1862–96) adopted Hinduism to attain ‘Kshatriya’ status in the caste system and gain legitimacy in mainstream Hindu culture. This was elitist and lacked popular support. Sen observed: ‘the Maharaja spent a lot of money on importing Brahmin pundits from Bikrampur (now in Bangladesh) and these greedy pundits openly drank water touched by the Tripuris, including the king to declare them kshatriyas’. Though the British took over the princely states of Manipur and Tripura, they did not establish direct imperial rule and the states remained formally ‘independent’. This prevented the development of mass political consciousness. Biren Datta, the communist leader recalled (Biren Datta, 1982): ‘we had no idea of the relationship between British imperialism and the princely rule of Tripura. Since childhood we were used to thinking that we were the subjects of an independent state and that the rest of British India was outside the boundary of our state’. The anticolonial nationalist freedom movement spread later in Tripura and had different characteristics. During the late-nineteenth century, Tripura witnessed spectacular demographic transformation. Due to massive influx of refugees from the present Bangladesh, the tribal majority state was reduced to a tribal minority state. Tripura is the only state in India which has seen successive waves of migration reducing its original inhabitants to a minority in their own land. The

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royal family steadily encouraged Bengali settlement. The first census in 1872 showed that the tribal proportion of the population had been reduced to 63.76 per cent. By the turn of the century the tribals were down to 52.89 per cent. Between 1941 and 1951, the chaos of Partition led to the reduction of the tribal population from 50.09 per cent to 34.68 per cent. During 1951 to 1961, the state received the largest number of refugees as shown by the abnormally high decadal population growth (81.71 per cent). Tripura today has a Hindu population of 89.34 per cent with a few Buddhists (2.67 per cent) and Christians (1.21 per cent). Muslims suffered a heavy decline from 20.14 per cent in 1961, suffered a heavy decline to 6.67 per cent in 1971. The state capital Agartala is a Bengali city where over 93 per cent are Bengali speakers. The state did not witness the growth of a tribal middle class and those in liberal professions were immigrants. The Tripura ‘Renaissance’ under Maharaja Bir Bikram was mainly brought about by the Bengali ‘surplus Bhadralok’ from outside who received royal patronage. Education in the princely regime did not reach all tribes. Most of those who benefited were Bengali Hindus. A conspicuous result of the growth of literacy was the rise of educated unemployment especially among the tribals, which lay at the root of the middle class discontent with the Tripura rulers’ discriminatory employment policy favouring Bengalis at the cost of the local tribal people. Local educated tribal youth had either to be content with jobs at the lower levels of the administration or none at all. Many left the state and those who did not, remained unemployed. Educated tribal youth from the rural areas could only find jobs in the royal bodyguards or the Tripura Rifles, a force under the control of the Nepalis thanks to the royal marital connections. The veteran tribal communist leader Aghore Debbarma, himself a victim of the situation in the 1940s, pointed out that those educated youth who formed the Tripura Rajya Jana Sakhya Samiti (JSS) in 1945 for eradicating illiteracy in Tripura, were all unemployed persons. This was the breeding ground for the anti-Bengali sentiment and attitudes dominating the Tripura

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Praja Mondal (TPM) in the late 1940s, which protested against the employment of outsiders. This anti-Bengali sentiment was the basis of the communist movement in Tripura in its early stages as pointed out by Aghore Debbarma. The nature and dynamics of political conflicts in the state were crucially influenced by the social structure and agrarian relations (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 42). Two types of social organization prevail in Tripura: caste-based Bengali social organization and community-based tribal organization. The Bengali-Hindu social organization in the state is very similar to its counterpart in Bangladesh. Of the 68.56 per cent Bengalis of Tripura today, about 6.75 per cent are Muslims (about 20 per cent until 1961). The Muslims have a more egalitarian social system than the Hindus. Of the remaining Bengali Hindus, 46.70 per cent are upper caste Hindus and 15.11 per cent are Scheduled Castes. Since the late 1930s, the Muslims of Tripura, mostly peasants, have supported the communist movement; and peasant organizations of the communists in the early 1950s were under Muslim leadership supported the GMP led by the tribal leader Dasarath Deb. However, the upper caste Bengalis resident in Agartala were never radical and democratic. This has been a significant factor in the evolution of the communists in their first phase (1938–48) and later. Tribal social organizations (despite the existence of several groups) exhibited some common features: absence of class and caste divisions; self-governing indigenous institutions; collective life based on tribe, clan and family loyalties; and hierarchical social authority. While each tribe enjoyed considerable autonomy in relation to the monarchy, within each tribe the Chieftain or the Sardar was the king, who as the royal representative was the real ruler of the tribal folk. Among the Reangs, the second largest tribal group in Tripura, the Chieftain was the king or raja, recognized by the Maharaja of the state. Among the Tripuris, the largest and ruling tribe in the state till 1947 and the first tribal group to become communist, the selfgoverning tribal council was called ‘Chaudhuri Naskar’, headed by the Chieftain or Sardar. The upper stratum of this tribe

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consisted of the princes, the ‘thakurs’ and the intelligentsia of the state who were influential in the making and unmaking of the king. The upper stratum of the Bengalis gradually assumed control of the affairs of the state and the Tripuris ‘lost direct links to the ruler and were reduced to backwardness’. A new agrarian class structure came into existence as a result of the demographic transformation of Tripura. The immigration of Bengalis, mostly landless and land-hungry peasants, brought about radical changes in the tribal agrarian structure, which was marked by shifting cultivation. The immigration of Bengalis and their favourable settlement with the help of royal land grants, upset the local ecological balance and gradually replaced the tribal people’s communal mode of production with another, based on private ownership of land. While encouraging Bengali settlement in Tripura in order to increase the area of settled agriculture in the state, the rulers discouraged shifting cultivation by the tribal people and ‘reserved’ forests in order to prevent them from continuing such cultivation. While in 1908, the state had an area of 15 sq miles of reserved forests, in 1942–43, the figure stood at 1160.05 sq.km. At the end of 1943 about one-fourth of the state was classed as reserved forest. This led to a sharp fall in the area available for shifting cultivation. This made the tribal people resort to cultivating the same land over and over again unproductively, which reduced them to poverty and dependence on money lenders and businessmen. The floodgates were opened for the transfer of tribal lands into the hands of moneylenders and businessmen. Large-scale alienation of tribal land into nontribal lands over the years became a potent source of ethnic conflict in Tripura. The end of princely rule in 1949 was not to the liking of the tribal population. Their demographic majority was thin, the influx from east Pakistan continued and New Delhi’s administration of the state depended entirely on the Bengali dominated bureaucracy. Tribal insecurity was heightened by the efforts of the Government of India to crush the Upajati GMP and the nascent communist movement. The brutal police actions against unarmed tribal villagers at Golaghati in 1948 and Padmabil in

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1951 convinced many tribal people that a militant organization in defence of tribal interest was essential (Bhaumik 2007: 100). During the late 1930s and early 1940s, Tripura was marked by weak Congress nationalism, growing communist movement and a major tribal rebellion in the shape of the Reang Rebellion mentioned above. Before merger with India in 1949, the kings of Tripura controlled Comilla and parts of Chittagong, Noakhali and Dhaka divisions now in Bangladesh and they invited many high-ranking Bengalis to their kingdom. Further, they encouraged Bengali migration into the state to help organize and maintain the local administrative structure. The migrant Bengali peasantry introduced and developed wet rice cultivation and helped enhance the royal revenue. Bengali became the language of administration and the medium of communication between the different tribes.

Nontribal migration and ethnic conflict The massive immigration of nontribal people from East Bengal into Tripura after 1947 changed the demography of the princely state and the ethnic conflict generated by the demographic transformation intensified during the 1970s to the 1990s. Further, the loss of direct geographical contact with India affected the state’s economic growth despite the availability of natural resources. Rail/road connectivity was exiguous with less than 150 km of rail lines and badly maintained roads. Three distinct phases of Bengali migration into Tripura (Bhaumik in Saikia, 2007: 95) were: precolonial and colonial migration; migration after Partition; and migration after the 1971 Bangladesh liberation war. A low-intensity migration is an on-going phenomenon. Land alienation was not a big problem as long as the tribals had enough time and the Bengali emigration remained limited to urban areas. The Bangladesh liberation war in 1971 changed all that with a large increase in the tribal agricultural population. The incidence of tribal poverty continues to be high due the nature of their economic activity and their concentration in forest areas with poor access to services (Bhaumik in Saikia, 2007: 97–8). While

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poverty is prevalent both among Bengalis and tribals, the Bengalis had been used to sharp class differences in Bangladesh. The tribals lost their land mostly to Bengalis who were more advanced and this sharpened the ethnic divide. This process occurred along with the transition from shifting cultivation to settled agriculture, commodification of land and the processes of urbanization and modernization. Despite the presence of British imperialism, Tripura continued as a princely state till its merger with India in 1949. The incorporation of Tripura into the periphery of the British Empire had led to major socioeconomic changes (Bhattacharyya, 1990: 2209): (i) significant reduction in the tribal population from 1872 to 1951; (ii) revolutionary changes in agrarian structure introduced by the migrant Bengali landless peasants; (iii) the gradual elimination of the communal mode of production and introduction of plough technology and the emergence of agrarian classes in society; (iv) the tribal masses surrendered their lands to the immigrants who brought about agrarian modernization; (v) this, coupled with the reduction of number of the tribal people in their own state, resulted in the growth of anti-Bengali sentiment; (vi) a significant number of middle-class Bengalis migrated to Tripura seeking professional opportunities; (vii) there was some growth in literacy, which led to the emergence of a new class of educated tribal youth who were to become the new leadership in Tripura resulting in ‘Tripuri nationalism’; this remained the heart of much of tribal discontent in Tripura in the 1940s and provided a powerful impetus to the further development of tribal discontent. The emerging communist movement in the late 1930s could not ignore the growing tribal discontent. Adaptation to the local environment and utilization of available opportunities became the essential goals of the movement.

Communist militancy The communist movement in Tripura originated with a series of democratic movements represented by Jana Mangal Samiti (JMS) or Popular Welfare Association, the Jana Shikshya Samiti

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(JSS) or Popular Literacy Association and the Tripura Proja Mandol (TPM) or Tripura Citizens’ Association. These three movements played a crucial role in the development of the communist movement, which fundamentally influenced the dynamics of political conflicts in the state. The communists tried to integrate the class idiom with the ethnic idiom in the evolution of their activities but not to the full satisfaction of the more politically conscious tribal leaders. The JMS was formed in September 1938 by Bengali professionals and former activists of the revolutionary ‘Anushilan’ movement. An elitist upper-class organization in the Bengali city of Agartala, it had limited influence. But it introduced the modern language of politics and spoke of policies, interests, plans and programmes. It believed in arguments, representations, discussions, demonstrations and decisions. The dominant language of politics in the mass movement represented by the Reang Rebellion (1943–45) had been that of violence. This was a great change. The Simon Commission on Constitutional Reforms, 1938 provided the JMS an opportunity to express its views and mobilize public opinion. The JMS aimed at responsible government and civil rights under the monarchy. Probhat Roy and Bansi Thakur (both Tripuris), founders of the JMS, stressed its loyalist character. There was a preponderance of Bengalis in the policy-making bodies of the JMS and Biren Dutta, founder of Tripura communism, held an important position. Despite the cautious views of the dominant leadership of the JMS, the first issue of the party journal revealed communist influence by asking for a full responsible government under the monarch. Though there could be no calls for violence as a method of agitation, Dutta’s message to the producing classes of Tripura was to ‘organize and unite’. The JMS was contradictory in expressing allegiance to the monarch and at the same time attacking princely officials, mostly upper caste Bengali Hindus. While praising the monarch it held the officials accountable for all the problems. This form of attack was not to the liking of the officials who expelled most of the

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leaders from the state and put the others into prison! The elitist, city-based organization that the JMS was, it was not able to explain and espouse the tribal demands and their critique of Bengali officials nor able to incorporate genuine peasant demands into its programme. The communists radicalized the JMS but could not effectively raise the tribal question as a fundamental question of Tripura. Though it failed to raise this issue it did manage to prepare the ground for future recruits for the communist movement. The Jana Shikya Samiti (JSS) was the first Tripuri democratic organization formed on 27 December 1945 on the initiative of a few educated tribal youths, mostly Tripuris, to launch a mass literacy campaign. A sense of ‘Tripuri nationalism’ provided a powerful ideological impetus to the movement with its founders believing that the key to the building of a self-conscious Tripuri nationality lay in mass literacy. The fundamental goal was to promote mass literacy in a state with only 8 per cent literacy in 1941. Twenty-two tribal youths who met in a two-day conference considered illiteracy to be Tripura’s central problem. Since the JSS was intended to be a nonpolitical organization, communists like Biren Dutta were not invited. Though the aim was to launch a struggle to eradicate illiteracy and poverty, JSS had a wider perspective. JSS nationalism was a positive search for a Tripuri identity and was not directed against the Bengalis. The communists in Tripura supported the JSS and Biren Dutta was in close touch with it though without holding any organizational position. Under the impact of communist radicalization, JSS became a vehicle for the promotion of communism in Tripura. It was partly under communist influence that JSS decided to support the Tripura Proja Mondal (TPM) movement launched in 1946. TPM was formed in January 1946. After the withdrawal of the legal ban on political activities in Tripura, TPM was a broad-based nationalist platform to fight for responsible government and civil rights. Ideologically, it was based on a sense of nascent Tripuri nationalism demanding responsible government in the state by getting rid of the Bengali domination of the government and the state. Like the JMS, it was an upper caste

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Agartala-based Bengali organization. It had only three Tripuris in its organizational hierarchy, two of whom were president and secretary. The secretary of the local unit of the CPI represented the communists in the TPM and Biren Datta the prominent communist, edited the party organ. Given the diversity of backgrounds from nascent nationalists to communists there were differences among members regarding tactics. Probhat Roy was a loyalist and constitutionalist and Biren Datta stressed the popular dimension and the need for organized action and nonviolent protest. Biren Datta noted two historical forces standing in the way of realization of responsible rule: (i) the medieval feudal regime; and (ii) the Bengali bureaucracy. The TPM’s basic demands were two: (i) Tripura as a state should belong to Tripuris; and (ii) a popular government under the monarch should exist in which the state subjects alone would elect representatives after excluding the Bengalis in power. The movement was not against the Bengalis but it was the movement of an oppressed but rising nationality. Dasarath Deb, future communist leader, clarified that though some Bengalis would be excluded they can always become citizens by satisfying certain conditions of citizenship. Some Bengali bureaucrats and ministers would be removed but not all Bengalis from the state. Power would go to the people. The TPM did not succeed in achieving its objectives. The Bengali leadership of the TPM was blamed for this and a demand was made for Tripuri leadership. Though it was a Tripuri political movement for self-determination, it was not led entirely by Tripuris. An important and powerful part of the leadership remained Bengali. It was confined to urban areas dominated by Bengalis. However, the communists were sincere in their identification with the TPM. Its failure lay in its methods, which were constitutionalist and nonviolent.

Agrarian revolt, 1948–51 The peasant unrest in the state led to the armed struggle (1948–51) initiated by the GMP, an organization of tribal

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peasant militancy. Massive regional discontent lay behind the emergence of the GMP. The end of the monarchy in the late 1940s was not followed by the establishment of a responsible government, which had been a political demand in Tripura since the late 1930s. Monarchy was replaced by bureaucratic-political elite. On 21 March 1948, the dowager queen took charge of the administration but the real power came to be exercised by the Bengali ‘Dewan’ AB Chatterjee. Tripura came under Congress rule effectively, which meant rule by the Bengalis who had been the target of tribal activism throughout the 1930s. The collapse of administration in the rural areas was a major cause of discontent. Though the Maharaja’s rule had been autocratic, he had had contact with the rural society through the system of a feudal hierarchy based on social and economic ties. The end of the regime disrupted the link without establishing a new one. The administration was virtually isolated from the rural areas. The Tripuri tribal dynasty became powerless after the changeover from monarchy to Dewani rule. The emerging discontent fuelled the GMP. The economic situation in Tripura was yet to recover from the impact of the Second World War when Partition impacted with a massive influx of refugees into the state. This was compounded by the economic blockade imposed by the newly emerging Pakistani government in East Bengal and supplemented by a devastating cattle disease and an acute food crisis. The Tripura regime had been suppressing every form of rural protest that emerged during the 1930s. Nationally, the CPI had been banned in 1948. In Tripura, the JSS and TPM were suppressed as well though not formally outlawed. The repression of the JSS, a popular mass literacy movement, led to discontent and desperation among the tribal people. The action was seen as an attack on the tribal community as a whole. The Tripura Rajya GMP emerged in 1948 from a secret conclave between the CPI and the JSS. It was led by Dasarath Deb, the leader of the mass agrarian discontent who later explained its origins and purpose in his document ‘Gana Mukti Parishad in Building the Peasant movement in Tripura’ (1986). The four founding members of

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the GMP, including Dasarath Deb and Biren Dutta were also members of the Tripura unit of the CPI, which had just then, in its Calcutta Congress, decided upon an insurrectionary political line. The GMP, however, had local roots in the JSS and its emergence rendered the JSS and TMP redundant. GMP decided to launch a vigorous response to the repressive policies of the Congress government. The Golaghati massacre of 9 October 1948 came in handy. In an ambush by the Tripura police, seven tribal peasants and two Bengali Muslims had been killed. The incident gave a new turn to the peasant movement in Tripura, particularly among the tribals and the resistance took a militant turn at Khowai and Sadar. The GMP utilized the events to justify its resort to arms and its strategy became a ‘distinctive synthesis’ of the Tripura experience with the Calcutta line of the CPI. Armed resistance necessitated the formation of a militant organization, which the GMP became with Dasarath Deb as President. A central committee was formed at its first state-level meeting at Kumarbil in July 1948. Immediately after the Golaghati incident, the GMP opted for guerrilla warfare, recruiting most of its warriors (about 3,000) from the disbanded soldiers of the First Tripura Rifles battalion constituted during the Second World War. A Code of Conduct was prepared to keep the soldiers under political control. Village, block and divisional level committees were set up and by 1950 organizational presence was established at each locality of the Tripuri community. A combination of ill-defined nationalism and communism was the ideological cement of the GMP. The leitmotif of organization was a powerful opposition to the Congress party at the Centre and the state. This aspect was highlighted to get the support of all the tribal village chiefs who had been the powerful social base of the monarchy in Tripura. ‘Monarchy ended and the Tripura Congress captured the throne’ was the slogan! It was this synthesis of a class approach with tribal nationalism that was the ideology of the GMP and the strategy was to mobilize the tribal chiefs and other notables. Autonomous development though in close association with the communists,

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gave the GMP protection from destabilizing external forces. There was no move to merge the movement with the Kisan Sabha of the CPI; it was felt it would be suicidal to impose class struggle in Tripura which had not experienced ‘sharp class divisions and contradictions’. The GMP began armed resistance after the Golaghati incident in October 1948. Earlier on 15 August 1948, it had organized a massive demonstration in Agartala demanding a popular government, withdrawal of warrants of arrest, removal of the Dewani rule, release of political prisoners and an end to police repression. The Calcutta newspaper The Statesman summed up GMP activities as follows: ‘the disturbances took the form of violent opposition to procurement of rice and paddy at the prices fixed by the government, clashes between armed bands and police and military personnel, kidnapping of persons suspected of helping the authorities . . . individual police men are also under attack and their rifles taken away’ (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 97). This was just a partial summary by the pro-government paper but the reality was much wider. The armed agrarian struggle was serious in the Khowai subdivision, where military rule had to be imposed. Indigenous forms of popular protest were widely used. Military rule was unsuccessful and became highly unpopular and the possibility of its withdrawal had to be considered. However, it had to continue given the state police resistance to the move. The government increased police powers, the Tripura State Security Act, 1948 had to be extended up to April 1951. In the wake of the military repression following the Padmabil incident (April 1949) in which three tribal women were killed and the Asharambari murder case (August 1949), GMP intensified its resistance. At Kamalpur, a predominantly Tripuri group was organizing the Reangs who had earlier been part of the Reang peasant resistance against the Maharaja’s government. This region followed in the footsteps of the other divisions so far as political action was concerned. As in Khowai, the GMP movement in Kamalpur too became violent. However, the movement in Sadar, a predominantly Bengali area, remained dormant.

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Relief work by distribution of looted paddy among the faminestricken people was part of the GMP’s class action. To collect paddy, GMP resorted to force and threat of force preventing the government from collecting any paddy from the people in the name of procurement. The government responded by tightening up its machinery and equipping itself with more powers to deal with what was perceived as growing ‘communist menace’. This, however, barely contained the growing movement among landless and poverty stricken people and others. In August 1950 the CPI changed course from the Ranadive line to the ‘Rajeshwar Rao line’. There was a change from the urban guerrilla warfare line to the rural guerrilla warfare line based on the Maoist–Chinese experience. The leaders who brought the new line to Tripura included Nripen Chakraborty, the future chief minister of the state. Their arrival marked the intervention of the all-India CPI in the locally developed GMP movement. At this time, the government was already strengthening its repressive approach. Large-scale arrests of communists followed. An important feature of the armed struggle in Tripura after August 1950 was the communist attempt to recruit from the state armed forces and the police. As part of their offensive guerrilla actions, the GMP conducted several raids on military and police camps and looted arms and ammunition. Government’s intensified repression had a devastating effect on the lives and property of the people. Increasing military camps in rural areas created doubts in the minds of activists about the prospects of continuing armed struggle. The growing isolation of the GMP from the people was also a factor. The armed struggle was not formally called off but temporarily suspended. During 1951–1952, the GMP took decisions which revealed the distinctive features of its politics: the influence of the all-India CPI’s political line and its increasing grip over the local movement. GMP expressed concern for world peace and appealed to all people irrespective of caste religion and creed to support its appeal for peace. In order to rebut government propaganda that it was an anti-Bengali movement, it emphasized its broad-based

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nationalist character: ‘The Tripura Rajya GMP is a democratic and revolutionary organization of the Tripuris, Bengalis, Halams, Cakmas, Manipuris, Kukis, Jamatiyas, Reangs and all Hindus and Muslims!’ The GMP’s communism meant a movement predominantly locally determined and shaped but it received powerful external support. On the basis of its local strength it asserted its independence and autonomy. Its success in dismantling established authority in some parts of the state, setting up an alternative structure of power and retaining it for quite some time indicated a high level of mass mobilization. It however failed to draw on the experience of the earlier Reang rebellion. In the course of its revolutionary practice, GMP recruited 300,000 members out of the state’s then total population of over 700,000. With the abandonment of armed struggle, the GMP provided the local unit of the CPI 800 dedicated and proven party members. Though the GMP was not dissolved, its platform was taken over by the local CPI, which also derived its mass base from the former. The newly aroused Tripuri ethnic consciousness was subordinated to the class theory and the Indian nationalism of the CPI. The ethnic identity crisis of the Tripuris remained unsatisfied. It was to take a virulent new form after 1967 with the formation of the ethnic party, the Tripura Upajati Juba Samiti (TUJS). As noted above, the GMP with a decade of experience and organization-building was not dissolved but subordinated to the authority of the increasingly powerful Tripura unit of the CPI. The GMP was flexible enough to adapt to the dynamics of Indian communism and comply with the directives of the all-India CPI leadership. The course of Tripura communism during 1951–52 was changed on the basis of two important inner-party documents: one prepared by Nripen Chakraborty in 1951 and the other by Dasarath Deb in 1952. The Chakraborty document was intended to orient the CPI to the newly emerging political situation in the country involving participation in parliamentary politics. The Deb document prepared after the first general election in Tripura

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(1952) was intended to explain the integration of Tripura communism with the all-India Communism (Chanda, 1983: 12). Chakraborty stressed organization in place of spontaneity and the need for the CPI in place of the GMP, which had arisen spontaneously out of a peasant movement starting with the Reang rebellion (1943–45). It now needed an organized party such as the CPI to guide it out of localism, nationalism, opportunism, sectarianism, terrorism and ‘tailism’. India’s Partition had destroyed Tripura’s economy, which had been taken over by outsiders. The central government had passed repressive laws, brought about the Golaghati massacre and introduced the military into Tripura. People were fed up with the ‘freedom’ brought by the Congress. GMP had organized all the agrarian classes on the common slogan of resisting the onslaught of the police and military of the Nehru government. However, it had no clear strategy to resolve the contradiction between the working class and the peasantry. Chakraborty offered a series of arguments in favour of the need for a communist party to lead the GMP and put forward the case for adopting electoral tactics, legalism and peaceful means of struggle under the leadership of the CPI. Deb on the other hand evaluated the successful experience of the CPI in the 1952 general election and pointed to the way forward.

Parliamentary communism Tripura communists emerged as the most powerful electoral force in the parliamentary and state assembly elections in 1952. Their share of popular votes in the former was 69.21 per cent and in the latter 48.03 per cent. The achievement was remarkable because of the semi-legal conditions and state repression that prevailed against the GMP, which was then underground. The Congress party was reduced to a minority with 25.58 per cent of the parliamentary and 27.33 per cent of state level votes. Scholars traced the roots of massive discontent to the poverty and landlessness of the people. Ajoy Ghosh, CPI leader said the party would focus on constitutional opposition to the policies of

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the Nehru government and the Tripura party unit said that the election results proved the party’s commitment to the peaceful reconstruction of society. Scholars traced the CPI success to the GMP’s virulent and violent opposition to Congress rule (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 155). By the next parliamentary and state assembly elections of 1957, however, due to electoral registration of Hindu refugees from East Bengal, the political balance shifted in favour of the Congress. The growth of the Tripura CPI during the period from 1952 to 1965 was substantial and by the mid-1960s the party had very powerful and pervasive influence in the politics of the state.

Tribal resistance: Tripura Upajati Juba Damiti (TUJS) A persisting tension remained between the approach of the CPI and that of the GMP with regard to the tribal question. While class was important to the communists, the GMP perceived ethnicity to be more important in dealing with the tribal issue. This tension was never resolved adequately and there was growing tribal dissatisfaction over the CPI’s failure/inability to pay sufficient attention to the ethnicity issue. The emergence of the exclusively ethnic organization, the TUJS, was an outcome of the tension. The TUJS, set up in November, 1967, had a profound impact on the political landscape of the state. The party was a real challenge to the political base of the communists who had grown up on the strength of the GMP, the leading radical nationalist tribal organization, though mainly of the Tripuri/Debbarma community. The TUJS became the third most important party in the state after the post-split (1964) Communist Party of India (CPI-Marxist) and the Congress party. The rise of the TUJS should be related to the relative failure of the communists to articulate tribal interests in the face of the staggering demographic transformation of Tripura during the post-1947 period. In a way, the TUJS drew on the experience of the Assam

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movement, which was focussed on the ‘foreigners’ issue. A new group of educated but unemployed tribal youths (a section converted to Christianity) became influential in the TUJS. Though focused on rural issues, TUJS leadership was urban. Bijoy Kumar Hrangkhwal, founder of the organization was the son of a Christian evangelist who had studied in mission schools in Agartala, Jampui and Shillong and was editing an English newspaper. Another leader Harinath Debbarma was a graduate and taught in a government-aided private school in Agartala. From its inception the TUJS articulated rural issues in the local idiom. Its perception was that the GMP, under the influence of the CPI, had failed to meet tribal expectations. Its main demands were: tribal self-determination; unification of cognate tribes; restoration of alienated tribal lands; Autonomous District Council (ADC) under the Sixth Schedule; reservation of more jobs and seats for tribals, etc. After 1971, the TUJS improved its electoral strength mainly at the cost of the communists. The main reason for the growth of the TUJS lay perhaps in the failure of the state government to persuade the Bengali community that the tribal people had good reason to reclaim lands alienated from them. Its anti-Bengali virulence emerged only after the formation, in 1983, of ‘Amra Bangali’, a virulently pro-Bengali outfit. The TUJS was the first tribal party in the state to attract supporters from all the major and minor tribes and its leadership was representative of the tribal mix of the state. The party founder Hrangkhwal also set up the Tripura Sena (Tripura Army), which was to become his major power base. He followed a twofold strategy of organizing mass action through rallies and meetings and built up a large body of trained guerrilla volunteers. He was the link between his party’s over-ground and underground wings. The creation of friendly Bangladesh in the early 1970s dashed Hrangkhwal’s hopes of staging protracted guerrilla warfare based in Bangladesh soil in Tripura to grab political power. However, the Congress government’s move to de-reserve the 1950 tribal reserve created by Maharaja Bir Bikram for occupation by Bengali refugees and its decision to set up a high gravity

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dam on the river Gumti in the Dumbur valley by submerging large agricultural and forest lands utilized by the tribal gave grounds for his charge that the state had a ‘government of the refugees, for the refugees and by the refugees’. After its defeat in the 1967 state assembly elections, the CPI (M), the leading communist party in the state, began to develop a base among the Bengali community instead of focusing mainly on tribal demands, as did the TUJS. At this time, land, language and leadership emerged as the main concerns of tribal politics. While the TUJS concentrated on the seventeen reserved seats in the state assembly, the CPI (M), keeping electoral considerations in mind, played down tribal issues. Hrangkhwal warned of insurgency if at least 50 per cent of the area of Tripura was not reserved for the emerging tribal ADC. His opting for insurgency was based on his perception that the trans-border situation after the assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Bangladesh was more favourable for the adoption of insurgent tactics. Further, his defeat in the 1977 parliamentary polls made him reject the moderate approach of his party colleague Shyama Charan Tripura and look to militancy to gain political mileage. The militant Tribal Student Federation (TSF) and the Tripura Sena were behind Bijoy Hrangkhwal in his radical approach. He, however, did not go underground. The groundswell of opinion on the state government’s insensitivity on tribal problems helped Hrangkhwal who had always wanted to take the TUJS towards ‘demonstrative militancy’. He always saw the communists as a threat to the growth of the TUJS. The defeat of the Congress in the 1977 general election in the country was followed by the fall of the Congress government in Tripura. A period of instability came and two successive coalition governments were propped up by the communists. Hrangkhwal began to contact Bangladesh authorities and contacts in the Mizo National Front (MNF) to examine the possibility of launching a movement. In December 1977, the CPI (M)-led Left Front in Tripura swept the polls to form the first Marxist government in the state. However, the electoral performance of the Left Front in the tribal areas was a matter for worry. The

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TUJS with four seats from the reserved areas was the single largest party in the assembly and the Congress did not win a seat.

Tribal resistance: Tripura National Volunteers (TNV) It was clear that the Left Front government would make a move towards forming the ADC for tribal areas. TUJS saw itself being outmanoeuvred by the Left Front and adopting ‘competitive radicalism’, demanded that the proposed ADC should be ‘administratively delinked’ from the state government and that the Bengali refugees who had come after 1949 should be pushed out of the state. This was an attempt to corner the Left Front government and make the TUJS politically strong in the tribal areas at the cost of the CPI (M). Other developments in the region contributed to the conviction of the TUJS that the time had come to do something big for the tribals of Tripura. The base for building an insurgency existed already in the Tripura Sena and the militant Tribal Students Federation of the TUJS. The Tripura National Volunteers (TNV) was formed in 1978 with two dozen volunteers from the Tripura Sena. Hrangkhwal was the President and Chuni Koloi the Commander in Chief. Both came from deprived backgrounds. Hrangkhwal was from a poor displaced peasant family and Koloi from a family of a tribal chief who had been steadily dispossessed of his vast land holdings. In early 1979, the first group of TNV volunteers led by Chuni Koloi proceeded to MNF headquarters in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT). In the subsequent period a joint MNF/TNV group carried out attacks on the BSF units in Tripura. Hrangkhwal had a threefold strategy: (i) send TNV groups to MNF bases for training to prepare a viable insurgent outfit; (ii) maintain the Tripura Sena/Tribal Students Federation at a high level of militancy; and (iii) elbow out the moderates from the TUJS. He put pressure on Left Front government for the earliest setting up of the ADC for tribal areas under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. The Left Front went

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along with TUJS demands but at the huge cost of protests by the militant Bengali outfit ‘Amra Bengali’. On 10 March 1979, TUJS organized a massive rally in the state capital and soon afterwards Hrangkhwal left for Delhi to meet the MNF chief Laldenga for discussions on stepping-up activities. However, in October 1979, following an MNF/TNV attack at Amarpur in Tripura, a top activist of the TNV was arrested. The Left Front government had now concrete proof of Hrangkhwal’s involvement with the MNF in forming an insurgent outfit/movement in Tripura. The Kanchanpur conspiracy case was launched and Hrangkhwal went into hiding. TUJS denied its links with the TNV and claimed that it was the creation of Hrangkhwal! Caught between two militant outfits, the TNV and the Amra Bengali, the Left Front government tried to expedite action on the creation of the district council. In secret talks with Hrangkhwal, the state chief minister Nripen Chakraborty shrewdly agreed to withdraw the Kanchanpur conspiracy case and release TNV detenus from prison because he believed the only way to prevent tribal insurgency in the state was to accommodate the militant fringe of the tribal politics. He knew that there were strong grounds for the existence of tribal discontent in the state. Though Hrangkhwal continued with his militant politics he tried not to incur the displeasure of the Left Front chief minister for some time. After the Amarpur incident, Hrangkhwal was forced to resign from the TUJS and Tripura Sena and adopt a milder tone. His deal with the chief minister of Tripura had merely been an attempt to save his political career. The party again was forced into extremism because of the CPI (M)’s sweeping electoral victory in the 1980 parliamentary poll, the passing of the Autonomous District Council (ADC) bill in the state assembly and the declared aim of holding elections to the ADC in June 1980. At the twelfth state conference of the TUJS held at Taidu in March 1980, a more radical political posture was adopted: (i) deportation of all foreign nationals who entered the state after 15 October 1949; (ii) extension of Sixth Schedule provisions to the ADC; (iii) restoration of tribal lands alienated

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after 1960; (iv) introduction of tribal language Kokborok as medium of instruction; (v) stoppage of forest plantation extensions till the settlement of shifting cultivators; (vi) recognition of Manipuris as a Scheduled Tribe of Tripura; (vii) introduction of ‘inner-line permit’ in the state; and (viii) reservation of 50 per cent broadcast time in All India Radio for tribal programmes. The party also supported the on-going Assamese agitation on the foreigners’ issue. The radical posture was adopted with an eye on the forthcoming elections to the ADC. Though some leaders felt that Bijoy was going a bit too far towards extremism, none opposed the Taidu conference resolutions. The party proposed a ‘bazaar boycott’ on the issue of deportation of Bengali refugees and the Congress and the ‘Amra Bangali’ (formed in 1983) announced boycott of the ADC polls. The situation became explosive and the result was the emergence of ethnic violence in a malignant form, the proximate cause being the nasty role of the ‘Amra Bangali’. A drunken brawl at Lembuchara sparked violence at Amarpur in the South District killing twenty tribals, which was followed by the massacre of hundreds of tribals at Mandai near Khowai in West Tripura. As the news spread, the state’s predominantly Bengali police force went berserk and joined the majority Bengali population in the brutal killing of tribals across West and South Tripura districts. The Disturbed Areas Act was invoked and the Army deployed to contain the violence. The CPI (M) party organization largely failed to meet the challenge. Its dependence on the administration and failure to combat sectarianism was evident. As the riots spread Bijoy Hrangkhwal stayed away from trouble. However, he along with senior TUJS leaders was arrested for complicity in the violence along with Amra Bengali leaders. When hundreds of tribal youth were indiscriminately arrested for complicity in the riots, they became natural recruits for the underground. A large number departed for the TNV base camp in the CHT. A promise of a rifle was good enough to attract the revenge-hungry tribal youth. A fresh boost was given to the insurgency. Just as the TNV appeared to be in a revival mode, Hrangkhwal, on his release from prison

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and under tremendous pressure from the Left Front government, announced the disbandment of the TNV. And the TUJS wanted to live down its extremist connections and resume its course in legitimate politics.

Tribal resistance: All Tripura People’s Liberation Organization (ATPLO) However, Hrangkhwal’s followers, not too happy, got together the MNF-trained new tribal groups and set up what was called All Tripura People’s Liberation Organization (ATPLO) in 1980 with Dulal Hrangkhwal as Chairman and Binanda Jamatia as General Secretary. Though an improvement over the TNV and the earlier ‘Sengkrak’, and the organization having created its own line of command, the absence of Bijoy Hrangkhwal’s support prevented MNF from backing it. As ATPLO failed to make an impact, the Left Front government gained political ascendancy over tribal Tripura by successfully holding ADC elections. Internal differences forced Binanda Jamatia faction to kidnap Bijoy Hrangkhwal presumably to prevent him from joining up with the Chuni Koloi faction, which carried out a dramatic attack on the Manu police station in the North District. Bijoy Hrangkhwal was freed from custody. The TNV was re-vivified with Bijoy as President and Dananjoy Reang as Vice President. Tribal insurgency in Tripura was revived, entering its final and most virulent phase. Binanda Jamatia who had lost his edge, negotiated peace with Chief Minister Chakraborty and the first batch of surrender of ATPLO activists took place on 23 June 1983. This was a political victory for the Left Front government in its contest with the Congress party in the state and the Centre. However, the revived TNV spelt more trouble for the Left Front. In December 1983, it launched its operations with an attack on the Lefunga police station, killing policemen and capturing weapons. This was the beginning of an intense phase of militant actions which peaked in the subsequent period lasting up to 1988. By then the Left Front was out and a Congress-led and TUJS-supported government was reinstalled in Tripura.

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The formation of the TNV in 1978, its abrupt disbandment and formation of ATPLO in 1980, its split of 1981 and final surrender to the government of Tripura 1983 constituted distinct phases. The nucleus of the insurgency was created in 1978–80 and the movement took shape in 1980–83. The revived TNV matured into a hard-hitting mobile force carrying out operations during the period from 1982 to 1988. The organization bade farewell to arms in a tripartite political ‘settlement’ with the Congress-led state government and the Rajiv Gandhi-led central government in 1988. The organizational structure and method of functioning of the TNV has been analysed in an excellent account (Bhaumik, 1996: 195). The TNV’s armed wing was organized in three battalions with four companies each. The state was operationally divided into three sectors in keeping with the then three administrative districts. A TNV ‘Major’ was in charge of each sector and each sector had three subsectors commanded by a ‘Captain’. The subsector commander had each a large squad under him called ‘duty group’ which would be split into smaller groups for the collection of funds. They would regroup in an area for operations and then split again either to lie low until combing operations by the security forces slackened or to make their way to the ‘base area’ in the CHT across the border. TNV developed a tight-knit network of ‘local squads’ in each administrative subdivision of the state, nine in all at that time. These squads were described as overground TNV. Each would have ten to twelve ‘tax collectors’ to serve tax notices, collect ‘tax’ and hand it over to the TNV ‘duty groups’ with accounts. Besides the ‘tax collectors’ each local squad had more than forty sympathizers/ supporters who gathered intelligence for the ‘duty groups’, maintained links with the TNV and legitimate parties like the TUJS, distributed propaganda material and even participated in some ‘actions’. As the deployment of security forces became more and more intensive in view of the growing operational profile of the TNV, the ‘local squads’ became more and more involved in ‘action against outsiders’. The TNV began to conserve its operational

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strength and a ‘duty group’ would be used only for an attack on a major target like a police station, a patrol party of security forces or a government installation. These actions were few and far between because of the TNV’s limited weapons-holding and limited ammunition stocks and its lack of armed manpower. It became necessary for ‘duty groups’ to split up, join with two or three ‘local squads’ and attack a couple of Bengali villages in a week of mass killings. Such actions were performed by a combined group of armed TNV volunteers from the ‘duty group’ who formed the core of the ‘action party’ and members of the ‘local squads’ who are usually armed with locally available weapons like country made guns or ‘takkals’ (machetes). Such actions served three purposes: (i) create panic and communal polarization to divide communities and expand party base; (ii) stretch the security forces in far-flung areas and make them adopt defensive postures; and (iii) provide publicity in excess of operational capacity. TNV’s annual expenditure was around 1.5 million rupees most of which was secured from vigorous ‘tax collection’. ‘TNV Day’ was observed on November 10, the day of its foundation. October 15, the day of Tripura’s merger with India in 1949, was observed as ‘Black Day’. The days of elections to the state assembly were observed as ‘Boycott Day’. On such days attacks were organized on Bengali villages, security forces, police stations and government installations. Indian national flag was burnt and posters left behind. Tax collection was based on rebel legislation, guerrilla activity was organized through the hierarchical armed wing, attempts made to set up a parallel judicial structure. ‘Boycott Day’ was designed as efforts to undermine state authority and to demonstrate rebel control over the tribal people. Over the years, the ethnic rebels in northeast India have consistently asked from the central government more than what they could be granted and have always been ready to scale down their demands when settlement was offered in the light of the perceived need to preserve the territorial integrity of the country. Power sharing arrangements were always preferred knowing

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well that secessionist rhetoric works well with the Government of India. After Rajiv Gandhi came to power in 1984, Hrangkhwal gave indications to the prime minister of his willingness to come to the negotiating table in the light of the political settlements reached in 1985 on the Punjab and Assam issues and the nearness of settlement on the Mizoram issue. Further, the Bangladesh and Chinese governments were perceived to be unwilling to support the rebel outfits of the Northeast. Desertions were taking place from TNV ranks further compelling a rethink on the part of Bijoy Hrangkhwal. Once it became clear that the Government of India was not willing to play ball with the TNV, rebel violence was stepped up between November 1985 and January 1986. Mayhem was created to force central and state governments to deploy increasing numbers of central paramilitary forces. Throughout the period of intense violence during the mid-1980s, the attempt was basically to put pressure on the Government of India to come to talks. A parallel administration was sought to be set up in mid-1987. On the lines of the experience during GMP period of the past, TNV sought to emerge as the guardian of the tribal people and widen its support base. In early 1987, MNF won the assembly elections in Mizoram and Laldenga became chief minister. This impelled Hrangkhwal to approach Laldenga for a settlement of the Tripura problem. The latter took up the matter with the central government. In July that year, Hrangkhwal was advised by central officials to approach former Chief Minister Lalthanhawla, a close confidant of the Indian prime minister. Discussions were opened through Lalthanhawla with the Union Home Ministry over the head of the Left Front government of Tripura. In a letter to Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, Hrangkhwal agreed to treat Tripura as an integral part of India on condition that the Left Front government of Tripura was dissolved and a ceasefire declared. Perhaps, Hrangkhwal’s demands were made in the light of the TUJS-Congress electoral pacts during 1983 and 1985 state assembly polls. It is noteworthy that the earlier settlements in Assam and Gorkhaland had been made with the political parties concerned and the state governments came into the picture only at a later stage and Hrangkhwal was

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keen that a similar approach should be adopted by the Centre with respect to Tripura and the Left Front government of the state should be left out in reaching a settlement! Bhaumik (1996: 241) has noted that the Congress party wanted the Left Front’s ouster after the state assembly elections due a couple of months later so that the formation of a Congress government could facilitate a settlement. TNV got the message and went on an orgy of violence in the state to facilitate the deployment of central police forces in the state, which was being opposed by the Left Front state government. Not less than 117 Bengalis were butchered in January 1988. A fortnight before the polls, the state was brought under the Disturbed Areas Act and army units deployed. The state’s Bengali press alleged that the violence was the outcome of the CPI (M)/TNV axis! The election results left the ruling CPI (M)-led coalition two seats short of majority and a TUJS/Congress coalition government came into existence with a thin majority. The level of violence came down as suddenly as it had earlier gone up! A tripartite agreement was signed between TNV leaders, Union Home Ministry and the Tripura government on 12 August 1988 bringing the insurgency in the state to a temporary end. Bhaumik holds that the experience of Bijoy Hrangkhwal is likely to influence ambitious tribal youth in future who see no prospect of succeeding in the present competitive political system. Tribal insurgency may recur in the state from time to time unless mainstream political parties such as the CPI (M) and the Congress (I) address the tribal issue and recognize the quest for distinctive identity.

Tribal resistance: National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) and All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF) The 1988 Accord led to a further split within the TNV and TUJS resulting in the emergence of two other militant tribal groups: the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) and the All Tripura TigerForce (ATTF). The Congress–TUJS alliance which came to power in 1988 after ousting the Left

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Front government systematically attacked the tribal activists of the Left in an attempt to take over the tribal ADC. Hundreds of Leftist tribals were implicated in false cases. The Left leaders failed to protect them as a result of which many of them went underground to form the ATTF in July 1990 supported by some elements of the Left. But when the Left coalition came back to power in 1993, the ATTF leadership could not decide whether to surrender and seek state patronage or continue the underground armed struggle. The Lalit Debbarma faction went in for a peace accord with the government in August 1993 but the chairman of the party Ranjit Debbarma held back with his followers under the new name All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF). They targeted the Bengali settlers viciously and also started to use mass abductions as a strategy for the first time in Tripura. ATTF demanded the expulsion of all ‘foreigners’ who had entered Tripura after 1949, removal of their names from the electoral lists and restoration of all alienated tribal lands. It developed close links with the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) and had nearly 600 cadres. ATTF support base was confined to western Tripura and a small pocket in the south. The NLFT was set up in March 1989 by former TNV Vice President Dananjoy Reang with the help of some TNV returnees who did not get rehabilitation benefits. It had a controversial relationship with alleged Christian fundamentalists. Its cadre strength was around 900 at the height of its activities but weakened afterwards with a main faction led by Biswamohan Debbarma. It was further split by Dananjoy Reang who founded the Tripura Resurrection Army (TRA) who finally surrendered with his supporters to the state government. There were two further splits in 2002–03: top operations commander Nayanbashi Jamatia broke away and came overground with his supporters; later another faction led by Kamini Debbarma and Mantu Koloi came overground with his own followers. Nayanbashi later returned to the jungles, unhappy with the negotiations with the government and has formed a new group which attacks security forces. NLFT’s main faction is still led

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by Biswamohan Debbarma and Dhanu Koloi who was military chief till recently (Bhaumik, in Saikia, 2007: 107). The NLFT’s demands include the establishment of an independent Tripura through armed struggle, liberation from neocolonialism, the raising of consciousness against exploitation and promotion of indigenous language and culture. The role of militant Christianity in its activities is a matter of controversy. There were a series of incidents in which Hindu temples and priests were attacked and local tribals intimidated to convert to Christianity. In early 2001, over a hundred NLFT cadres left the group on grounds of alleged corruption and sexual abuse by the leadership. Over 70 per cent of the NLFT cadres come from the Debbarma Tripuri and Jamatia tribes. Tripuris constitute 57 per cent of the tribal population, which gives the state its name. The clan comes from the western part of Tripura, the part heavily affected by the Bengali Hindu settlement and land seizures. A substantial percentage of NLFT cadres and 90 per cent of its core leadership are Baptist Christians and first-generation converts (Tripura police website). The focus of NLFT attacks are three: Bengali Hindu civilians and settlements; Hindu clergy and Hindu religious institutions and symbols; and CPI (M) cadres and militants. The party is seen as the political champion of the Bengali Hindu majority which dominates administration and politics in Tripura.

Tribal resistance: 1993–2003 The years from 1999 to 2003 witnessed the most intense tribal militancy in Tripura (see Appendix IV for a list of non-state actors in Manipur and Tripura). Both ATTF and NLFT were on the rampage. With their leadership secure in their bases in Bangladesh’s CHT and the Sylhet region, the cadres attacked security patrols and Bengali settlements. Violence, intimidation and mass abductions took place (Vohra, 2011: 147). High profile assassination of Bimal Sinha, a CPI (M) minister and leader, and the abduction of legislator Pronob Debbarma took place. A parallel administration in many parts of the hill regions

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of Tripura and total helplessness of the state police are well described by Vohra in his recent book. Huge funds were being raised by systematic taxation and mass abductions. In one incident, over forty passengers were kidnapped. In other incidents, large numbers of Bengalis were killed in outlying villages. Up to about 150,000 to 200,000 Bengalis were reported displaced. These attacks and abductions and displacement provoked severe reactions from Bengali Hindus especially the fighters of the United Bengali Liberation Front (UBLF). Originally founded as a vigilante group in the Agartala area in late 1999, UBLF was soon outlawed by the state authorities for its involvement in the killing of Christian missionaries and attacks on churches during 2000 and 2001. Vohra (2011: 50), a DG of police in Tripura during the early 2000s, provides a graphic account of the functioning of the insurgent groups in the state, the helplessness of the local police in dealing with the situation and his own approach and initiatives to meet the dire situation. By 2004, with the change of guards at the top, the scenario showed marked improvement. The splits that took place among the militant groups and the forceful counter-militant actions by the state police were the factors that contributed to this development. A combination of tested tactics in the field, some unconventional methods to improve the morale of the Tripura police and the Tripura Rifles and better coordination with central paramilitary police and intelligence collection helped matters. Militant groups were penetrated and split and periodic surrenders took place. Those willing to surrender were encouraged to carry out missions against bases in Bangladesh to demoralize militant leaderships and promote factional rivalries. Nayanbashi Jamatia, a militant leader was encouraged to come overground followed by his group. Better coordination and cooperation with army units helped. Bhaumik (2007 in Saikia, 110) has noted that violent militant incidents declined from 380 in 2003 to 210 in 2004; civilian fatalities from 302 to 81; security forces fatalities from 216 to 105; militant fatalities rose marginally from 61 to 63

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but declined steadily thereafter. Only thirty civilian fatalities were reported in 2005 and fourteen in 2006. Security forces fatalities fell sharply too during 2005 and 2006. Seventy-two cadres of the Manu Koloi and Kamini Debbarma faction and 138 of the Nayanbashi faction of the NLFT surrendered in 2004. These developments meant that neither the NLFT nor the ATTF was able to mount serial killings and kidnappings of the kind they had mounted until 2003. In the early 2000s, Tripura had become the ‘abduction capital’ of the Northeast (Vohra, 2011: 126). A dramatic decline from 440 in 2000 to 311 in 2003 was reported. The figures were 200 for 2004, 115 for 2005 and 73 reported cases (incomplete) in 2006. Extortion cases had declined as well. NLFT target of collections had reportedly fallen by half and of ATTF by 60 per cent. Inability to meet these targets was a significant indicator of the decline of militant activities. Elections to the Tripura Tribal Autonomous District Council (TTAADC) had always been affected by serious militant activities. In 2000, the NLFT backed Indigenous Nationalist Party of Tripura (a combination of TUJS and Indigenous People’s Front) was able to dominate these election results because of 176 militant incidents involving a hundred deaths, 86 injured and 172 abducted. The 2005 elections were peaceful. Only one case of an ambush of the CRPF party was reported.

State response Tripura with its hilly and densely forested terrain is helpful to the insurgents and not so helpful to the security agencies. Militants in the state have also benefited from the support of elements across the border as Bangladesh surrounds Tripura on all sides almost completely. Area domination has been the core police strategy. Nearly 400 camps of police and paramilitary force personnel were said to have been set up in the interior tribal areas. In addition, 2,600 special police officers in 105 special police pickets were set up. The existing network includes sixty-five

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police stations and thirty-seven police outposts in twenty police subdivisions in the state’s four districts. Every unit has been provided with arms, ammunition, weapons, fire power and manpower. Upgradation in terms of communications, mobility, etc., improvements in response capacity and provision of coordinated force at the command of each district superintendent of police were undertaken (Bhaumik in Saikia, 2007: 111). Simultaneously, the intelligence capacities of the militants were eroded through appropriate police actions. The network of overground collaborators and collusive organizations were targeted with 1,863 arrests between 2002 and 2005. This contributed to the dilution of militant capacity in the civil society. Traditional targets of extortions/abductions such as traders, tea garden managers, railway and road construction organizations and workers were provided enhanced security. Bhaumik (in Saikia, 2007: 113), who hails from Tripura, claimed that the time was ripe for ethnic reconciliation. Land being the main problem in the state, he suggested the decommissioning of the Dumbur Hydel Project, submerging 46.34 sq.km of fertile prime land to resettle up to 25,000 to 27,000 landless and marginal tribal families. Power requirements of Tripura could be met by new gas-based projects on the anvil. The revival of a self-sustaining and contented tribal peasantry, economically and emotionally rehabilitated by the allotment of fertile land resources in the Dumbur valley area would help win the hearts and minds of the tribal population of the state. The limited ability of state governments in India to bring about social change, socioeconomic justice and governance applies to the Northeast as well. In the all-India power equations, Tripura counts for nothing with only two members of parliament in the Lok Sabha. Tripura’s plan assistance was poor even by the poor standards of the Northeast. During the Sixth Five Year Plan (Bhattacharyya and Nossiter, 1988: 162) Tripura received Rs 495 per capita assistance as compared to Nagaland (Rs 1,624 per capita) and Sikkim (Rs 2,316 per capita), two other ‘special category’ states. Until 1972 when Tripura became a full-fledged state under the Indian Constitution,

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there was not much scope for formulating development policies independently of the central government. With poor natural resources, bad internal and external communications, absent rail link and overall isolation (Tripura’s border with Bangladesh is five times as long as that with the adjacent Indian states of Assam and Mizoram put together) and the tiny population (about 3.2 million), the quantum of cash available, domestic or centrally allotted, was insufficient to launch major development projects. Plan contributions at current prices in 1972–73 were only Rs 51 per capita and Rs 222 in 1982, well below the national average despite special factors such as refugees, tribals and near total dependence on agriculture. Further, funds approved by the Centre were far from fully utilized: 82 per cent of the state plan outlays and 56 per cent of the central schemes in 1977–78. Estimates of poverty as reported in 1988 (Bhattacharyya and Nossiter, 1988: 163), was that 80 per cent of the rural population and spent less than Rs 40 per capita per month and 92 per cent less than Rs 80. Literacy was only 42 per cent overall and down to 12 per cent among tribal women (see Human Development Report of Tripura, 2007 for recent assessments). Planning in Tripura has emphasized social services, agriculture, irrigation and power. However, the western parts of Tripura (plains urban areas) benefited from modern education, communication and healthcare. The largely hilly and the tribal east areas were neglected as were the Scheduled Castes and Tribes.

Left Front government A Left Front government was in power during 1978–88. It was pledged to redirect planning to the relief of the poor and involve people in the process of planning while improving the growth potential of the economy. The shift in objectives and popular involvement through Panchayats, blocks and ADC were concretized in the Sixth Five Year Plan (1980–85) and a distinct improvement in standards of living and a more equitable distribution of assets and income were seen. Both Sixth

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and Seventh Five Year Plan (1985–90) attached importance to social and community services and agricultural and rural development. Progress was made during 1978–88. Decentralization of plan execution especially through the TTAADC was effective. Allocated funds were more fully utilized and some additional funds for particular projects obtained. However, the shortcomings in Tripura during 1978–88 were (Bhattacharyya and Nossiter, 1988: 164–5): (i) the growth rate of the agricultural sector; (ii) identification and distribution of surplus land; negligible progress in industrialization; (iii) villages still without primary schools; imbalance in healthcare in the urban and rural areas; (iv) appearance of a new class of vested interests benefiting from the welfare measures; and (v) absence of any real popular involvement in plan formulation. Agrarian reform, a major concern for the state government, was caught up in relations between Bengalis and the tribals. The princely state had had no agrarian reforms at all and the first such legislation in the state was the 1960 Act. Landlord-tenant relations were governed by a law of the 1986 and the land system resembled that of Bengal. The 1960 Act dealt with (i) the abolition of intermediaries; (ii) the rights of the cultivating tenants; (iii) land ceiling and the acquisition of excess land; (iv) proper maintenance of records; and (v) the prevention of alienation of tribal lands. All transfers from tribal to nontribal needed prior permission. The Act was more symbolic than substantive. The failure of the 1960 Act to dent rural inequality led to a major amending Act in 1974. Legislation implemented by a bureaucracy and adjudicated by courts close to the power structure was not a solution. Government needed to show the will to carry out reforms by mobilizing public support. This was missing. Unlike in West Bengal, the fundamental problem in Tripura was the restoration of illegally transferred land from Bengalis to the tribals in the absence of any record of sharecropper rights and the presence of politically powerful Bengali interests. The 1977 Left Front manifesto recognized this but the performance was inadequate. The 1988 election manifesto stated that the left front’s ‘most remarkable achievement’ was

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the formation of the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC). The CPI (M) land reforms minister Biren Datta was disillusioned with the government’s achievement of its agrarian aims and resigned on health grounds. He stated later (Datta, 1983: 19–21): ‘the record of rights of the sharecroppers is far below the expectations of the exploited’. He added that in ‘my whole career as land reforms minister, I could not get the Agricultural Workers Act passed because of fears all around the party of losing the support of the middle classes and absentee landlords’. Datta added ‘in 99 per cent of cases, we failed to record the sharecroppers’ rights and we have bypassed the Agricultural Workers Act’. Reliable sources said that only Datta and Chief Minister Nripen Chakraborty did not possess land.

State development record Although no detailed narrative account of the development record of the Left Front government in Tripura under the Seventh to the Eleventh Five Year Plan periods has been made in the Tripura Human Development Report 2007, the Mid-Term Appraisal of the Eleventh Five Year Plan (IDSK, 2011) provided some glimpses on key issues of health, education and poverty. While Tripura has a better record in terms of some important dimensions of human development such as elementary education and health in comparison to other states in the region, widespread economic deprivation continues. No separate estimate of poverty is available. The Planning Commission has taken the stand to take the poverty headcount ratios of Assam as estimated from the NSS quinquennial surveys and apply the number to all the states in the Northeast. There is an urgent need for better poverty statistics for Tripura for any meaningful poverty monitoring. The 2007 Human Development Report of Tripura noted that the demographic transformation of Tripura led to the reduction of the tribal population from 50 per cent in 1941 to 31 per cent in 1961. Though the insurgency in the state has lost its momentum, its remnants continue to indulge in violence. The Report has examined the three basic components

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of the Human Development Index (HDI), namely literacy, life expectancy and per capita income and found that according to international norms a moderate level of human development has been achieved in the state despite the prevailing conflict situation. In respect of the economy, the growth of state domestic product (SDP) has been sectorally unbalanced with very limited contribution from the manufacturing and agricultural sectors. Agriculture has been affected because of lack of irrigation development. Monitoring income poverty has been handicapped by lack of estimates of poverty in the state as well as in the other states of the Northeast except Assam. Reports say that there is a high incidence of rural poverty in Tripura. Generating sustainable livelihoods for the tribal population dependent on shifting cultivation was a big challenge. The Scheduled Tribes and Other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006 could be a major step forward. Further, large scale unemployment persisted especially among youth. In urban Tripura, one in five young men was unemployed and so was one in six young women. While there is a significant rise in literacy there is a need for more teachers. Progress in public health and maternal and child care has taken place along with Total Sanitation Campaign in 2001. A CPI (M) report (1986: 171–6) dealt with the problem of continuing tribal extremism. The emphasis was on educating the party cadres that the conservation of tribal rights was a struggle of the whole party. Class differentiation among the tribal people created a fertile ground for ‘petty bourgeois sections to be swayed by chauvinism’. Further, the party’s reviews of the 1983 assembly, 1984 ‘panchayat’ and 1985 TTAADC elections admitted ‘loss of support among middle classes especially in urban areas’. After the Mandai 1980 riots, the party obliquely acknowledged failure to manage communal tensions. Human security, understood as the human rights of the tribal population of Tripura who were in a majority in the state before it was submerged by the massive influx of Bengali population both before and after Partition and the Bangladesh war, has been the central issue.

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Development, signifying progress in human well-being and equated with economic growth, is no longer considered adequate. Average per capita income growth is not sufficient to achieve human well-being. There are other factors such as health, education or security. Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI) was put forward as a series of alternative objectives. UNDP’s Human Development Report (1990) defined the development objective as enlarging people’s choices in a way that enables them to lead longer, healthier and fuller lives. UNDP developed the concept of human security in 1999 to encompass not just the achievement of minimum levels of material needs but also the absence of severe threats to them of an economic or political kind: job security, income security, health security, environmental security and security from crime. The Commission on Human Security (Stewart, 2007: 144) has expanded the definition to mean not just the absence of violent conflict but the presence of human rights, good governance, access to education and healthcare ensuring that each individual has the opportunity to fulfil his or her potential: freedom from want, freedom from fear, and freedom of the future generations to inherit a healthy natural environment. ‘These are the building blocks of human and therefore national security’. Mahbubul-Haq (1998) spoke of human security as being concerned with ‘the security of people not just territory’ emphasizing the importance of ensuring the ‘security of all people everywhere-in their houses, in their jobs, in their streets, in their communities and also in their environments’. Tripura has been seriously affected by state violence, and non-state violence and insurgency in the last three decades. Non-state violence owes its origins to inter-related factors including the demographic transformation of the state from a tribal majority state to a nontribal majority state. This ‘demographic inversion’ as the Tripura Human Development Report (2007: 104) puts it, had an adverse impact on the indigenous tribal community’s sense of self-identity, leading to their opposition to the Bengali-speaking migrants. The perception of historical lack of access to education led the tribal elite in Tripura to launch in 1945 the ‘Jana Siksha

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Andolan’ (‘People’s Education Movement’). In spite of such a large scale and sustained movement, tribal education in Tripura lagged behind. Most of the surrendered militants in the state turned out to be school dropouts. However, the spread of education in recent times led to a rise in aspirations, awareness and consciousness of identity all of which contribute to militancy. The role of the GMP was significant. Dasarath Deb, the main leader of the agrarian revolt in Tripura, was later to become chief minister of Tripura. Under communist influence, the GMP tried to emerge as a nondivisive movement but successive Congress governments in Tripura tried to undermine the bases of Left influence in the Hills. Areas set aside during princely rule as tribal reserves were thrown open to refugee settlements, resulting in large-scale displacement of tribal people from forest lands. The Land Reforms Act of 1960 (Tripura was then still ruled directly from New Delhi as a ‘Part C’ state) was amended in 1974 under Congress rule to legalize transfers of all tribal lands up to 1969. The Left Front which came to power in 1978 took the first steps to restore lands to tribal people. The Sengkrak (‘Clenched Fist’) movement, which came up in 1967 was the first phase of militancy in the state. It was active in the Manu, Chhamanu and Kanchanpur areas of the then North district and some parts of Khowai in West district. The movement was brought under control in 1968. The TUJS emerged in 1967 and it divided the tribal support to the communist movement. In 1978, an underground movement called TNV commanded by Bijoy Kumar Hrangkhwal came up. In collaboration with the MNF of Mizoram, TNV conducted violent activities for over a decade (1978–88). In June 1980, TNV-led violence resulted in the death of over 1,800 people both tribal and nontribal. ‘Amra Bengali’, a Bengali-chauvinist organization retaliated and thousands of dwelling units were burnt down. The violence undermined social cohesion and destroyed intercommunity peace. After the 1980 violence, a group led by Binanda Jamatia left the parent TNV and formed the ATPLO at Thangnan in Bangladesh. However, the ATPLO surrendered to the authorities in

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1983. In the state assembly elections in 1988, the Left Front was forced out of office by sustained campaign of political violence by oppositional forces. Within 4 months of the elections, the militants came out of the jungles and signed a Peace Accord with the newly formed Congress–TUJS-led state government and the central government led by Rajiv Gandhi. The Accord was futile and the militancy continued.

Tribal resistance In the next state assembly elections in 1993, the Left Front was elected to office. The two outlawed groups NLFT and the ATTF continued their militancy and violence and carried out a campaign of mass killings, extortion, kidnapping, intimidation and arson. Their main target was the ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist). Both groups operated from their camps in Bangladesh and resorted to hit-and-run guerrilla tactics against civilian and government targets. They had the common aim of the removal of the Bengali migrant population. At the same time they had their own mutual conflicts and contradictions affecting the security of the common people. The 1990s witnessed the mushrooming of many small underground outfits numbering in all about thirty whose overground collaborators had links with either the NLFT or the ATTF. All of them vanished gradually. The emergence of a section of the Baptist Church in Tripura as the ideological mentor of the NLFT was a new phenomenon. At one stage, the NLFT asked its tribal supporters to adopt the religious doctrines of a section of the Baptist Church. Unlike the ATTF, the NLFT decided to participate in all elections, from the TTAADC to the state assembly and the parliament. The NLFT-backed Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (later renamed the Indigenous Nationalist Party of Tripura, INPT) threatened dire consequences if the voters supported other parties. The ATTF called upon people to boycott all elections. The emergence of the UBLF in 1999 was a further security threat. The UBLF started killing innocent tribal people in areas with mixed populations in Kalyanpur and Khowai subdivisions in 2000. The arrest of

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Biplab Das, leader of the group in April 2000 brought an end to the organization. The character of insurgency and the demands of militants have changed over time. When the first groups emerged their demands included separation from India; the expulsion of all ‘foreigners’; peace negotiations in third countries under UN auspices; a full-fledged tribal state within the Indian Union; and the up-gradation of the TTAADC to the same status as the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) in Assam. Both the NLFT and the ATTF have undergone fragmentation into many groups with mass desertions and criminalization. Militant activities in the state have had an adverse impact on the provision of education, healthcare and food. It has displaced human beings and affected the living conditions and lives of women. In 1999, owing to militancy, students in 29 out of 181 middle schools in the tribal dominated areas of the state could not appear for their examinations. Many schools had to be converted into camps for displaced persons. Similarly, intimidation and violence was carried out against health workers in remote hill areas. In many locations where there are no medical or paramedical persons in position, the militants have urged local people to go to unqualified traditional medical practitioners such as ‘ojhas’. During the violence in the 1990s, public distribution of food was hit hard. Ration shop owners were attacked and subjected to extortion. Where they found it difficult to transport supplies to shops they had to close down their shops. Militancy has caused harm to people especially women and children by causing displacement and relocation of population on a large scale (Subramanian, 2007: 213). In 2004, militancy had caused forcible displacement of 20,494 families from seven subdivisions in the state. Violence targeted both tribals and Bengalis. In June, 2004, NLFT (Binanda Jamatia group) was reported to have driven out 12,000 tribal people from their hamlets in the remote Gandachherra subdivision for their failure to pay extortion money. Bengali speaking villagers in many areas in the West district were forced to leave and had to be

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resettled in different cluster villages. Frustrated over their failing support base, the NLFT and ATTF militants indulged in savage attacks on poor people at the dead of night. On 24 September 2005 eight agricultural workers were brutally killed at Hazaripara village in Khowai subdivision in West district. The Manipuri community and Muslims were also subjected to similar attacks. During elections to state assembly, parliament, panchayats and TTAADC militants indulged in disruptive activities to intimidate and coerce voters. During the March 2003 state assembly elections they caused 50 deaths of voters by their violent activities. Since 1997, some 35,000 people of the Reang community from Mizoram entered north Tripura and were sheltered in six camps in the Kanchanpur subdivision. Their repatriation back to Mizoram was made possible only recently. A national policy on displaced persons is needed. Tribal unrest in Tripura was directed not so much against New Delhi but against the exploitative princely regime during the colonial period. While in Manipur, Hijam Irabot Singh, the socialist leader was prevented from developing a strong political base ultimately marginalizing him politically, the communists in Tripura were able to utilize tribal militancy under the leadership of Dasarath Deb, Nripen Chakraborty, Biren Dutta and others to build up a powerful mass base against the Congress and later on, the TUJS. The mass base is still working for the communists who have given the state a corruption-free and honest administration. Tribal militancy, which still remains, has taken the shape mainly of organizations such as the TNV, the NLFT and the ATTF. This was contained by successful administrative and political action (Bhaumik in Saikia, 2007:110). Many of the extremists who surrendered between April 1993 and July 2001 (5753) narrated their reasons for doing so: frustration with life in the jungle; ill-treatment by leaders and erosion of confidence of members of the extremist groups in the leaders of the groups; disillusionment with extremist ideas; acute financial difficulties; forced religious conversion; gradual

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erosion of support in the hills and a growing urge among the common people for restoration of peace in society; mobilization of the security forces and the intensification of anti-insurgency operations with the help of information provided by the local people; the rehabilitation package of the State Government. In terms of community resistance, the case of the Jamatia tribe provides a telling example. During the past few years the ‘hoda’ (community council) of this closely knit tribe has been the rallying point of many in their resistance against the ‘gun-point tactics’ of the NLFT. As many as six ‘hoda’ members were killed at Noabari on 2 September 2000 by the NLFT. The NLFT militants forcibly closed eleven institutions and uprooted a large number of Jamatia families from their homes. Previously, on 29 December 1999, as many as twenty-one hoda volunteers were kidnapped by NLFT militants but the tactics of the militants backfired. Some tribal community leaders formed the Tribal Culture Protection Committee to counter the threat posed by the NLFT and have taken the decision to not pay any ‘tax’ to the militants (THDR, 2007).

Security forces The Tripura State Rifles (TSR) was created by the state government as a counter-insurgency force. Further, twenty-eight police station areas in full and six police station areas in part have been declared ‘disturbed area’ under the AFSPA. The NLFT and the ATTF have been declared ‘unlawful’ under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act 1967. Battalions of the CRPF and the AR have been deployed against the militants. Several units of the India Reserve Battalions have been created by the state government. The Annual Plan of Tripura (2012–2013) states that thirteen such battalions have been created. The state Human Development Report, 2007 states that TSR battalions are providing security to development programmes as well as conducting the usual security operations. In recent times, the militants have failed to prevent election campaigns or prevent people from participating in elections. Despite threats to life, the Tripura electorate has repeatedly

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and decisively voted in large numbers in elections: Assembly elections 2003; Lok Sabha elections 2004; Panchayati Raj elections 2004; TTAADC elections 2005. Popular disillusionment against the militants in Tripura has been a major development in the recent period. People’s initiatives to put a stop to operations of the militants appear to be bearing fruit. A former Director General of the Tripura police has provided an account of the measures taken during his time (2000–02) to tone up the all-round functioning of the state police in responding to insurgency (Vohra, 2011: 148). A positive account of the achievement under a successor DGP is provided in another report (Bhaumik in Saikia, 2007: 110) mentioned earlier in this book. A former officer of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in Tripura brought out, in an interview, the specific role of the central and state police forces and the role of the political leadership at the state level. He recorded success story. The Government of India’s role with respect to peace dialogues, raising India Reserve battalions, reimbursement of security-related expenditure, surrender-cum-rehabilitation policy, modernization of security forces, management of international border and diplomatic initiatives can be gleaned from the annual reports of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs. A memorandum of settlement was arrived at in 2004 in Tripura with a faction of the NLFT leading to surrenders by militants. A settlement with another faction of the same outfit was separately arrived at the same year later on with similar surrenders. If one looks at the data on the Tripura police (Kumar, 2006: 88), one sees that the strength of state armed police is larger than the number of state civil police. Under the scheme for reimbursement of security-related expenditure, the Union Home Ministry pays the insurgencyaffected state governments for the raising of India Reserve Battalions, logistics, ex-gratia grants and gratuitous relief to victims of violence, honoraria to village level guards, defence committees and home guards. The central government also provides for a 100 per cent centrally funded Surrender-cumRehabilitation Schemes in insurgency affected states of the

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Northeast (facilitating leakages!). Another important initiative in this connection is the provision for ‘modernization of police forces’, which seeks to equip state police forces. The role of neighbouring countries across the borders in the Northeast in seeking to buttress insurgent activities is a diplomatic challenge calling for a high degree of coordination between different government agencies. There is also the hugely expensive issue of fencing of India’s borders with neighbouring countries. Some of the problems that can arise in this area are brought out clearly in the Human Development Report of Government of Tripura, 2007.

Fencing militancy The state government claims that the tribal militants have been operating in the state from forty-two camps across the border in Bangladesh. The Indo-Bangladesh border in Tripura is 856 km long. To restrict the movement of militants and check illegal border trade, a proposal to fence the entire border was taken up. However, tensions have arisen between the Indian Border Security Force (BSF) and the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR). The militants killed a BSF officer and some men. Further, many of the Tripura towns (including the airport of the state capital, Agartala) are located either too close to or on the exact border, contrary to the provisions of the Indira-Mujib agreement of 1972. Further, about 35,000 people belonging to over 7,000 families were displaced and about 11,375 acres of cultivable lands of residents of Tripura falls across the Indo-Bangladesh border and into Bangladesh. Moreover, the cost border fencing itself is huge. The complications involved in border management in the Northeast are huge. (Kumar, 2006: 44–57) provides a graphic report of the organizational and management structure of the Tripura police and its field units in twenty police subdivisions, sixty-five police stations and thirty-two police outposts. Substantial state armed police battalions are buttressed by central paramilitary forces (CPFs). The report also brings out other counter-insurgency aspects and functions including the raising of new battalions,

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appointment of special police officers, village resistance groups, strategic innovations, coordination between state police and central police forces. Increasing paramilitarization of the police forces is underway to the detriment of much neglected civilian police roles. Kumar’s study refers to the 1988 settlement between the central and state governments and the TNV rebels that did not last and notes that the subsequent phase of malignant insurgency by the twin groups of NLFT (formed in 1989) and ATTF (formed in 1990), starting from mid-1990s reached its climax in early 2000s and claimed a large number of lives. He recommends a political approach to a military one in dealing with insurgencies. Apart from the steps taken in 2000–2003, proactive measures were conceived and implemented later (Bhaumik in Saikia, 2007: 110). The author concludes perceptively that the days of insurgency in Tripura are not over. The top insurgent leaders are still ensconced in their hideouts in Bangladesh and have the firepower and manpower to cause internal trouble in the tiny state. Democratic decentralization in Tripura (THDR, 2007) is more advanced than in Manipur, where it lags behind especially in the tribal hill districts where the demand for the setting up of Autonomous Districts under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution is still unfulfilled. Following the 73rd Constitution Amendment Act of 1993, Tripura introduced three-tier PRIs and elections to all three tiers have been held on schedule since 1994. There are at present 4 zilla parishads, 23 panchayat samitis and 513 gram panchayats under the Act. The TTAADC under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution is a unique feature. Unlike in some states in the Northeast, the district council in Tripura is not confined to a specific tribe but covers all tribes in the state. Northeast consists of ‘special category states’ for development funding. Expenditure by governments depends on financial support from the central government. Only 15 per cent of the state’s total revenue receipts come from its own tax and non-tax resources. Since financial constraints should not stall

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expenditures on human development, the central and state governments have to revisit the provisions of the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act. Surprisingly, the state government’s ‘roadmap’ (The Hindu, Sept. 20, p. 7) contains no article by a tribal author despite government policies that prioritizing tribal development and security. Writing on militancy, the Bengali author Sujit Chakraborty notes: (i) for several years, ‘terrorist activity’ (‘tribal resistance to elite policies’?) has continued (peaking in 2000) killing 453 civilians and 61 security personnel in 449 incidents; (ii) as a result of people’s organization and development activity, only eight civilians and a security person killed in 2009 and seven others kidnapped; in 2011 only one person was killed and twenty-four abducted in twelve incidents; in 2012 only three persons have been kidnapped; (iii) the state government rehabilitated 1,285 surrendered tribal guerrillas since 1998. Over the past 14 years, 1,705 extremists of different militant groups have surrendered to the state government; over 210 former rebels were provided vocational training and rehabilitation; (iv) militancy will be dealt with in a holistic manner by the state government combining development and security; (v) women police wings have been set up in all the sixty-five police stations in the state. The Tripura Human Development Report (2007: 113) admits that as part of security measures, a number of police stations and outposts have been declared as ‘disturbed areas’ under the AFSPA. The militant groups, the ATTF and NLFT have been declared illegal under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. In addition, ‘some’ battalions of the AR and the CRPF have been deployed in counter-insurgency operations. It seems that Tripura does not require the AFSPA, the AR and the central paramilitary forces. Kumar’s study (2006: 88) reveals that the state armed police strength stands at 12,774 while the civil police strength stands at 10,358, meaning that in addition to central paramilitary forces and the AR, the state (population: about 3.7 million) is heavily militarized/paramilitarized with the much-disliked AFSPA and UAPA in place.

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State response: an assessment Critical assessments of the causes and remedies for ethnic unrest in Tripura (Subramanian, 2000a, 2001, 2003) raised key questions, which needed to be addressed by the state government. A section of the Bengali scholars applauded the role of the Tripura State Rifles (TSR) battalions in fighting tribal violence and extremism loosely termed ‘terrorism’. The force, dominated by the ethnic Bengali community, was known for its depredations against the tribal people. The state government led by the majority Bengali community failed to initiate disciplinary action against TSR personnel who committed serious rights violations. Aspects such as dissension within the tribal leadership between ruling and non-ruling factions and neglect of development project implementation in the tribal areas came to light. The state government claimed that poverty figures in Tripura had climbed to 73.58 per cent of the population. The congress government that ruled from 1972 to 1977 was plagued by internal dissensions. A CPI (M)-led Left Front government ruled from 1977 to1987 and then a CongressTUJS alliance-led government followed (1988 to 1993). The CPI (M)-led Left Front gained power again in 1993 and is still in office. The basic issue between the tribal people and the Bengalis was the land question. The 1960 Land Reforms Act was more symbolic than substantive and very little land was restored for redistribution to the tribals. The government was unwilling to initiate and support popular participation in land reforms for fear of losing the Bengali vote. The autonomous tribal district council (TTAADC) set up in 1982 and placed under the Sixth Schedule in 1985 was ineffective because of the financial control by the bureaucracy at the state headquarters. The Left Front led governments of Dasarath Deb (1993 to 1998) and Manik Sarkar (1998 to the present) were mainly preoccupied with efforts to contain the aggravating tribal discontent and militancy and the limited achievement during 1993–98 was the surrender of about 2,000 tribal militants. Further, internal organizational problems in the ruling

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party and factionalism between the Bengali and tribal segments remained key issues. The Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) in the state suffered from weaknesses. In the 1990s, the Longai valley project (1996) for employment generation in an interior tribal area was successful because of local leadership qualities and commitment. However, the lessons learnt were not replicated. Another project on the development of wastelands for tribal people was found to have been systematically biased in favour of the dominant community (Subramanian, 2000a). The World Bank Rubber Project in 55 project villages in the four districts of the state demonstrated the possibilities; an interim project assessment had found that ‘out of the fifty-five villages studied, twenty-seven were affected by medium and high levels of extremist activity’. The achievements in these villages were not insignificant compared to the villages not affected by extremism. The limited programmes of rural development undertaken in the state are designed by the central government and bureaucratically implemented in all states with little regard for local specificities. Participation, responsiveness, accountability and transparency are not their strong points. Several constraints in the field limit their effectiveness in achieving stated objectives. A major programme of rural development, the Jawahar Rojgar Yojana (JRY) was never evaluated in the state. Further, the role of NGOs was discounted by a power-hungry state bureaucracy. Subir Bhaumik (in Saikia, 2007: 113) has pointed out that the land question in Tripura can be resolved without causing hardship to the Bengalis if the ineffective Dumbur electricity generation project were to be wound up to make available considerable areas of land for cultivation by the tribal people. Further, reserve forests in Tripura today cover 58 per cent of the total land following successive reservation measures. De-reservation of some reserves of these forest areas would make cultivable lands available for cultivation by the tribal people. A problem identified in relation to Marxist-led state governments in India relates to their being in office, not power (Bhattacharyya, 1999: 255). A process of ‘governmentalization’ of the

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political movement takes place and the party comes under the dictates of those in government. Excessive subservience to the bureaucratic officials on the part of inexperienced politicians affects governmental performance and priority setting. A further process, growing ‘paramilitarization’ is said to have occurred in the state. The strength of one of the two main militant groups, the ATTF was officially assessed as 300 and the other group, the NLFT consisted of 600 members. A huge military and paramilitary force of over 20 or more battalions were chasing only about 1,000 men of the militants armed mainly with country-made weapons! Finally, the scheme to fence the international border with Bangladesh became a ticklish diplomatic issue between India and Bangladesh. Tripura has a 856-km-long international border with Bangladesh (THDR, 2007: 154) and the challenge was to check the activities of two militant groups: the ATTF and two factions of the NLFT operating from forty-two hideouts in Bangladesh territory across the porous international border. Further challenges were the need to check smuggling and illegal immigration. The proposed solution in terms of fencing the entire international border is hugely expensive. By January 2006, fencing of 505 km of the border had been completed (THDR, 2007) involving several central and state government agencies. The fencing policy while checking movement of militants, illegal immigration and trade, created tensions between the border patrols of Bangladesh and India. The Bangladesh Rifles demanded strict observance of the 1972 Indo-Bangladesh Treaty prohibiting either country from taking up permanent constructions within 150 yards of the border line. Construction of border fences caused displacement of people in the border villages. Nine out of fifteen subdivisional headquarters of Tripura are located adjacent to the border and many major towns including the state capital Agartala, were affected by the fencing plan. About 35,000 people belonging to 7,123 families were evicted from their homes due to fencing and about 11,375 hectares of cultivable land fell outside the fences. Thus,

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the task of fencing has led to serious law and order problems. The fencing process was started in the name of fighting militant activity using even the draconian AFSPA and the AR often guilty of serious human rights violations. The idea of border fencing along the entire length of the India-Bangladesh border caused avoidable diplomatic tensions between the two countries (THDR, 2007).

Chapter 4

Assam Rifles and Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act 1958 Analysis and policy

This chapter will examine first the history and role of the Assam Rifles (AR) in the Northeast. This will be followed by an analysis of the history and role of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act 1958 (AFSPA) in the region. The incompatibility of the AR and the AFSPA with the official policy of working towards peace building as expounded in the NER: Vision 2020 report would be noted. Peace building in the Northeast today would require (i) repeal of the AFSPA; (ii) reconsideration of the role of the AR; and (iii) reversal of the militarization of the region. The constitutionality and necessity of the AFSPA and the need for the existence of the AR have been questioned by expert commentators and police professionals working in the Northeast. The National Police Commission report (GOI, 1981) in Volume VII has recommended the policing of the Northeast by a composite force inclusive of the AR, the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and the state police forces under the control of the local heads of police forces in the region. Following independence in 1947, the Assamese elites became concerned over internal and external security threats and the threat of potential balkanization of the Northeast. The AR, the historically unique north-eastern regional paramilitary force created by the British, and the inherited AFSPA were considered essential to meet these threats. Support from the deployment of the military and central armed police forces in the region was taken as given. State police forces increased nearly fourfold in numbers from 1978 to 2012 (Appendix I, Table A1.9).

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The AR was originally set up as the ‘Cachar Levy’ in 1835. The Union Home Ministry’s latest annual report claims that it is ‘the oldest police/paramilitary force’ in India. Starting as a tiny unit, the AR expanded in successive stages to extend British control over the Hill areas of the Northeast and also defend British holdings in the plains of Assam against intrusion from tribal people in the Hills. After independence, the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Ordinance of 1942 was consolidated into the AFSPA. The Naga insurgency, considered as the ‘mother of all insurgencies’ in the Northeast, was sought to be contained by the deployment of two divisions of the Indian Army and several battalions of the AR (Anderson, 2012: 123). The Indian Army has been consistently opposed to popular protest in the Northeast demanding repeal of the AFSPA. A former chief of the Indian Army firmly informed one of the chief ministers of the states that the demand for the repeal of the AFSPA was not acceptable (see Raghavan, 2012, cited below). Paradoxically, the AR remains a historical anomaly given that several other central paramilitary forces such as the BSF, the CRPF and the ITBP as well as local state police forces have come up for the tasks that the AR was originally intended to perform. In an absurdly contradictory and confusing arrangement, the Union Home Ministry (MHA) is in charge of the ‘administration and finance’ of the AR (GOI, 2011–12: 159), while its ‘operations’ are under army command. The other ‘Central Armed Police Forces’ (CAPFs), as they are now designated, are under MHA control. The tension between the MHA and the MoD over control of the AR and the operations of the AFSPA in the region has had avoidable hardship to the people of the Northeast who are increasingly at the receiving end of State violence. In the aftermath of the 2004 rape and killing of Ms Thangjam Manorama Devi (discussed in Chapter 2), the tension between the MHA and the MoD over the AFSPA came out in the open. The persistent reliance on the AFSPA (see the text in Appendix II), described as a ‘truly nasty and terrifying piece of legislation’ (Prabhakara, 2012: 228) together with the continued use of the AR under ‘operational’ control by the army affects the

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implementation of the peace moves mentioned in the ‘NER: Vision 2020’ (GOI, 2008d) and the ‘Look East Policy’ (LEP). The gap between the Vision 2020 approach and the reality of the human rights violations on the ground remains glaring and needs to be addressed. We examined the security perspective of the ‘NER: Vision 2020’ document in Chapter 1. This chapter makes a brief reference to the Look East Policy and the NER: Vision 2020 document and goes on to examine the history and role of the AR and the AFSPA. The conclusion notes a few major cases of human rights violations in the region. The LEP, 1990 envisaged qualitative changes in the state of affairs in the Northeast. The ‘NER: Vision 2020’ which followed, brought the Northeast into the wider LEP framework. The Northeast’s geographical proximity with Southeast Asian countries was considered a resource in promoting regional cooperation. The Assam Rifles Act (No. 47 of 2006) specifies that the force will (i) ensure India’s border security; (ii) undertake counterinsurgency in specified areas; and (iii) provide support to civil authorities in law and order. A standard work on the Indian Army (Cohen, 1990) does not mention the AR perhaps because in its origin, AR was considered a police force. The history of the force is available in many studies (DGAR, 2010; Palit, 1984; Shakespear, 1929; Sharma, 2008). The undivided province of Assam came under British rule in 1826. The tea industry was introduced in 1832 and the tea gardens, which emerged all over the state, were productive of huge income from exports of tea to Europe. Coal, oil and mineral resources also became available for colonial exploitation. Assam became relatively prosperous with new British establishments in different places. To tackle the raids by Hill peoples on British establishments and keeping the cost low, the British raised in 1835 the ‘Cachar Levy’ (DGAR, 2010: 118), as distinct from the regular army and the armed police. Constituted as a civil police and better placed than the armed police, the Levy replaced regular army units in tribal areas along the Assam border. It

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initially consisted of 750 men of all ranks headed by a civilian officer. It was conceived as the strong arm of the local administration to conduct frontier ‘watch and ward’ duties and maintain law and order in the tribal areas. Similar militias were raised in Jorhat (1838) and in the Kuki areas (1850). In 1862, the militias were reorganized as the ‘Frontier Police’. More battalions were raised in different areas. In 1878, a ‘Forward Policy’ was adopted to consolidate British control of the Hill areas. The Levies adopted offensive operations in the tribal areas and became known as the ‘Assam Military Police’. In 1917, after its participation in World War I, the force was redesignated ‘Assam Rifles’. Two distinguishing features of the AR today are its military leadership at the officer level and its military command and control during operations (Nanavatty, 2013: 81). As stated, it is now a ‘paramilitary’ force under ‘dual control’ of the Union Home and Defence ministries. The CAPFs such as the BSF, the CRPF and others, set up under the MHA after independence, gradually occupied pride of place in the ministry. The AR with only about forty-six battalions is a smaller force and became less important compared to the far more numerous CAPFs. Increasingly, the AR felt that it had become a ‘neglected’ force. Following the 2004 rape and killing of Thangjam Manorama by AR personnel who enjoy immunity under the AFSPA, discordant voices emerged in the MoD and the MHA over the divided identity of the AR. This added to the debate over the relevance and need for the AFSPA. The AR initially performed police duties but gradually it began to perform military duties. When the AFSPA was imposed on the Northeast in 1958, the AR benefited because of its immunity provisions. The national development and ‘national security’ concerns of the Government of India had led to continued application of the AFSPA despite public demands for its modification (The Hindu, 7 February 2013). Some commentators noted that the Government of India did not want to use this law in the Maoist-affected areas of central India but was using

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it freely in the non-Hindu, tribal-inhabited Northeast (Mukhim, 2012). The headquarters of the AR remains in Shillong in the state of Meghalaya, which was originally part of the undivided Assam. It has two Inspectorates General Headquarters, nine sector headquarters, forty-six battalions, one training centre and school, three maintenance groups, three workshops, one construction and maintenance company and a few ancillary units. The force has been performing both counterinsurgency and border guarding duties along the Indo-Myanmar border. The report of the group of ministers on national security in 2000 recommended (Nanavatty, 2013: 82), based on the principle ‘one border, one force’ that the AR should assume exclusive responsibility for the guarding of the Indo-Myanmar border. One top army officer, however, held that AR was not exclusively a border guarding force and its expertise in counterinsurgency is not to be ignored (Ibid.: 83). He felt that the guarding of the Indo-Myanmar border should be left exclusively to the CAPFs. The MHA’s annual report (GOI, 2010–11: 150) outlines the counter-insurgency role of the AR and reveals that its budget increased from Rs 635.2 crore in 2001 to Rs 2,283.36 crore in 2010. The total budget increase for all the seven CAPFs (including the AR) during the decade was from Rs 6,077.33 crore to Rs 19,791.57 crore. The CRPF budget went up from Rs 1,653.25 crore in 2001 to Rs 6,167.10 crore in 2010. There was a concomitant increase in the strength of the Indian Police Service (IPS) cadres. The Manipur-Tripura (total population: about seven million) joint cadre strength of the IPS, for example, went up from the sanctioned 120 to 156. The formidable increase in the number of civil and armed police forces at the disposal of the state governments in the region from 1978 to 2012 (see Appendix I,  Table A1.9) and the existence of fifty-one India Reserve battalions plus other CAPFs deployed on a semi-permanent basis in the region, do raise the issue of whether there was still any need to retain a separate force such as the AR just to perform counterinsurgency duties under the protection of the AFSPA. Is it the case that the

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state police forces in the Northeast are not trusted enough by the central government to perform counterinsurgency duties? The fifty-one India Reserve battalions are distributed to the Northeast states (GOI, 2010–11: 17) as follows: nine each for Assam, Tripura and Manipur; seven for Nagaland; five each for Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram; four for Meghalaya, and three for Sikkim. The cost is to be shared between the Centre and the states concerned. Additional money for the region is provided by the MHA under (i) reimbursement of security-related expenditure (SRE), which has increased from Rs 104 crore in 2001 to Rs 2,024 crore in 2010; (ii) modernization of police forces (MPF) from Rs 126.81 crore to Rs 1,599.15 crore during the same period. With expansion of the British control of the Northeast from 1878 onwards, the task of the ‘Cachar Levy’ changed from mainly defensive to offensive expeditions into the tribal areas and was eventually christened AR with forty-six battalions. The force carried out several major operations during the colonial era (DGAR, 2003: 17): the Kuki Operations (1880–82 and 1917–19); the Manipur operations (1886, 1891 and 1894); the Lushai Hills operations (1880–90, 1896, 1917–19); the Abor operations (1893–94; 1911–12); the Apatani operations (1887) and the Mishimi operations (1899–1900, 1911–12). The two World Wars had changed the organization and working of the AR. The change of nomenclature to ‘Assam Rifles’ came after its participation in the First World War. Further participation in the Second World War (1939–45) led to expansion in numbers and role. Its ‘operational’ control by the army in counterinsurgency operations, seems to conflict with its border-guarding duties. ‘Internal security’ and ‘counterinsurgency’ are best performed by the civilian police forces with better knowledge of local terrain and languages and local communities than paramilitary forces from outside. State governments have better control of their own forces than those from outside, which are under central government control. It is not clear why a colonially set up central force such as the AR functioning with the colonial AFSPA should be in charge

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of counterinsurgency, which is a law and order problem that should be dealt with by the state governments. Before independence, leaving out the princely states of Manipur and Tripura, the whole of the Northeast including the Khasi Hills, were part of the Assam province. The Ahom, the Bodo and the Khasi ascendancy over the Brahmaputra valley was followed by British control which was established in 1826 after the war against the Burmese in Assam. The AR’s strong Gorkha component was used in the series of frontier campaigns and later the ‘Khukhri’ was adopted as the insignia of the force. Gorkha ex-servicemen were encouraged to settle along the Assam foothills. The exploits of the AR marked the steady expansion of British power throughout the eastern Himalayan frontier. Its role in Manipur during the ‘Second Women’s War’ (1939–40) is well-documented (Parratt, 2005: 75–89). It was much expanded later and was regarded as ‘primarily a regional force’. The BSF came up only in the mid-1960s. After the Second World War, the AR was for some time made part of the civil police under the Assam Inspector General of Police. Following independence, however, AR was assigned its own Director General. As the number of battalions increased, the rank of the force commander was upgraded to a Lieutenant General of the army. During the 1962 India-China war, AR undertook a combat role behind enemy lines. It was also deployed in Sri Lanka in 1988–1990 on ‘Operation Pawan’. From five battalions in 1947, AR expanded to seventeen in 1960 and to twenty-one in 1968. The transformation of the Assam province into the multistate region of plains and hills in the 1970s and insurgencies that followed have further changed the role of the AR. Some doubts about its future were raised as well. Gradual militarization, often including long periods in field operations with the army and increasing involvement in counterinsurgency in the Northeast, made the once popular AR, into an increasingly unpopular force. It appeared likely at one stage that AR might revert to its original role as a ‘tribal service’ but it did not happen. More battalions were raised to meet military requirements. Its area of

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operation remained restricted to Assam under the control of the state governor and the provincial IG (later a military officer). The North East Frontier Agency (now Arunachal Pradesh), had special status under the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA). With no police force other than the AR in the NEFA, the overall budgeting and control of the force was with the MEA. The Governor of Assam exercised the powers of the MEA over the AR through the NEFA Secretariat in Shillong. The MEA and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) were working in tandem. Being a force under the command of the MEA, AR received excellent support. After the NEFA became a Union Territory in the mid-1960s, AR’s budget and administrative control was transferred to the MHA. The importance of the BSF increased rapidly. The ministry officials were ignorant of the historical background of the AR with its headquarters in faraway Shillong. AR’s ‘operational control’ was transferred to the MoD and the army. Lack of coordination between the MHA and the MoD over AR was perceived to have contributed to the creation of more BSF battalions for deployment along the India-Myanmar border, till then a prescriptive domain of the AR. The army was reportedly not happy with the deployment of the BSF outside its control. AR felt deprived of its position in the order of precedence in the hierarchy of paramilitary forces in the Government of India. Although doing a full-time army job with a federal status, it was left with the sense that it was only a ‘regional’ force. The AR’s ‘identity crisis’ became aggravated. It felt it was being given ‘step motherly treatment’ and had become ‘nobody’s baby’ (Palit, 1984: 316–17). If and when the border conflict with China is finally resolved and the local insurgencies are tackled, the army would have to disengage from the Northeast. The National Police Commission (1977–81), in a chapter on ‘Policing in the Northeast’ (NPC, Seventh Report, 1981: 76–83) said that the underlying principle of policing in the region should be ‘minimal policing’ and non-interference with tribal laws, customs and institutions; the gravity of offence and

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the sensitivity of the border and areas with mixed populations in the interior were to be kept in mind. It noted the lack of coordination between the BSF, the CRPF and the AR and stressed that the local police chief should have operational and disciplinary control over these forces. It said that though a number of CAPFs were located in the Northeast on a semi-permanent basis, their tasks would eventually have to be taken over by regional armed police forces. Instead of the recruitment of armed police battalions by each state in the region, the NPC suggested that there should be a composite force for the region as a whole called the ‘Northeastern Rifles’ including the AR to work as a ‘regional security force’. Objectively, internal security is a state subject in the Constitution. The formation of several new states in the region in the 1970s and the raising of new police forces (see Table A1.9 in Appendix I) along with the sanctioning of fifty-one India Reserve battalions in the Northeast states, the increased funding for modernization of state police forces and the reimbursement of security-related expenditure (SRE), reduce the need for a separate force such as the AR for performing internal security tasks in the Northeast. Are the repeated instances of human rights violations in the Northeast an indication of the increasing frustration of a ‘neglected’ force? Or are they a means by which AR communicates to the central government the message of its own indispensability in the Northeast? An official history of the AFSPA (GOI, 2007: 236–7) informs us that after the Partition violence of 1947, armed forces were deployed in large areas over long periods in the conflict-affected states of Punjab and West Bengal, and that laws were formulated with special powers for the army to use force by even noncommissioned officers to the extent of causing death; search of premises without warrant; and rescue persons providing them immunity from prosecution. A similar law was used in Nagaland after 1947 in the wake of the demand for independence by a section of the Nagas. The law was originally named the Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Powers Act, 1958. Two minor amendments later (when Manipur in 1972 and Mizoram

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and Arunachal Pradesh in 1987 became states), the law was simply called the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 (AFSPA). Its immediate predecessor was the Assam Disturbed Areas Act 1955, which had been used to meet the Naga insurgency within the undivided state of Assam. This state legislation was followed in 1958 by a central legislation to deal with disturbed conditions in the Naga-inhabited areas of Manipur. The Assam Act of 1955 is a ‘living’ legislation based on the ‘guidelines’ set by a 1942 Ordinance of the colonial government and is periodically renewed. The colonial legislation was replicated later at the initiative of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Chief Minister Bishnuram Medhi of Assam (Prabhakara, 2012: 231). When the AFSPA was passed in Parliament in 1958 (the only dissenter was Birsa Munda, a tribal Member of Parliament from Bihar), the Naga-inhabited areas in the Ukhrul district of Manipur were notified as ‘disturbed’, later joined by other Naga-inhabited areas. The Act was extended to the whole of Manipur on 18 September 1980 when unrest increased in the Imphal valley during 1979–80. The law was expected to be in force only for a year but the Naga insurgency continued. After the 1962 border conflict with China and the rebellion in the Mizo areas and unrest in other areas in the Northeast, the law remained in place. It now applies to any ‘disturbed area’ in the region. Some parts of the Imphal Municipal area in Manipur were exempted in 2004. Section 4a of the AFSPA allows ‘any commissioned officer, warrant officer, noncommissioned officer or any other person of equivalent rank in the armed forces’ to fire ‘even causing death’ upon any person acting in contravention of any law or order, any person carrying weapons or anything capable of being used as a weapon, and to prohibit the assembly of more than five people. Section 4c of the Act allows armed police personnel to arrest without warrant and with any necessary force ‘any person who has committed a cognizable offence’. Section 4d allows armed forces personnel to ‘enter and search premises without warrant’ to make ‘any such arrest’. Section 5 provides that the arrested person be handed over to the police with the ‘least

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possible delay’ (amended to 24 hours in 1997). Section 6 prohibits prosecution of any person in respect of anything done in the exercise of the powers conferred by the law. The AFSPA applies to any area declared ‘disturbed’ by the Government of India or state government, to be reviewed every 6 months. A 1972 Amendment of AFSPA provided that the central government without consulting the state government could declare any state or part thereof ‘disturbed’. Unlike in 1958, this time there was no debate in Parliament even though the Act covered more than 7 per cent of India’s population and more than 7.5 per cent of the land area of the country. As of 2008, much of the Northeast was designated ‘disturbed’ including (i) the areas of Arunachal Pradesh bordering Assam; (ii) the entire state of Manipur (the Imphal valley excluded); (iii) areas of Meghalaya bordering Assam; (iv) the entire state of Nagaland; and (vi) the hill areas of Tripura (HRW, 2008: 8–14). However, despite the law, militant groups have flourished and even grown in number. Official sources argue that this justifies the continuance of the AFSPA but others hold that its continuance has led to increase in the number of militant groups. AFSPA, which has been operating in the region for over 50 years, provides the basic environment in which the conflicts take place in the Northeast. Limited changes were made in the Act relating to who can impose the law and how long a detained person can be held. The Act constitutes de facto martial law and affects relations between (i) soldiers and civilians, (ii) central and state governments, (iii) industrial estates and its employees, (iv) civil society and government, and (v) India and her neighbours. It aggravates the culture of identity politics and puts counter-insurgency at the heart of planning and keeps development programmes in the hands of the central government. Since Partition in 1947, the North-East is almost completely cut off from the rest of India, joined only by a narrow corridor at Siliguri in West Bengal. Centred on the Brahmaputra and Barak river valleys, and consisting of eight states sharing borders with Bangladesh, Bhutan, Myanmar, China and Nepal, the region’s various ethnicities have links to Southeast Asia and

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the greater Himalayas. During the colonial era the hill tracts with several less advanced tribes were administered separately and classified as ‘excluded’ or ‘partially excluded’, preventing the intrusion of people from the plains to these sensitive areas. Colonial tea and oil interests were located in the Brahmaputra valley. After Independence, the politics of assimilation and integration, most notably in the Naga Hills and Manipur, provoked a violent response with separatist tendencies and led to the perceived need to impose AFSPA with special provisions for ensuring complete immunity to the armed forces in their dealings with civil society and armed opposition groups. After the Chinese intrusion into the Northeast in 1962 and the already present secessionist tendencies in the Naga Hills and Manipur (and later Assam), the main preoccupation of the policy makers in Delhi has been not just to maintain law and order but check secessionism. The fear of secessionism and fear over the role of hostile neighbours seem to have prevailed in keeping the AFSPA in force. Since 1990s, several international human rights organizations, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR), have protested against the serious violation of human rights under the AFSPA and appealed for the revocation of the Act. However, AFSPA is only one of the many repressive laws in force in the Northeast. The Jeevan Reddy Committee (2005), which reviewed the imposition of AFSPA after the Thangjam Manorama episode in Manipur, recommended repeal of the Act but wanted its basic provisions to be incorporated into the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 2004 (UAPA), to make it appear less discriminatory in the Northeast. The recommendation of the Committee has not yet been accepted presumably because of opposition from the army and the MoD, one of the two main central agencies concerned with security in the Northeast. AFSPA thus continues to provide a framework for military occupation in the Northeast and inevitable militarization of daily life in the region causing huge psychological burden on ordinary people. Insurgency in Manipur appears to have become a hugely beneficial

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proposition to politicians, bureaucrats and middlemen who milk the central government of enormous funds. The Reddy Committee report has an impact on the welfare of the local population and the implementation of the priorities of ‘NER: Vision 2020’ document. The Committee, which had five members but no woman is significant in the light of the increasing violence against women in the region as documented in official reports. Non-acceptance of the report by the government indicates that the move to set it up in the first place was a sleight of hand. The impact of state violence and counter-violence from armed opposition groups on women has been serious (Chenoy 2002: 132). Women are ‘routinely questioned and exposed to sexual harassment’. A study of women in armed conflict situations in the Northeast (Srikala and Goswami, 2005) identifies several categories of women who are affected: women relatives of armed activists, women relatives of state armed forces, women militants or combatants, women as shelter providers, women as victims of sexual and physical abuse, and women as peace negotiators and activists. The argument is that in militarized societies, even in locations where actual armed conflict is minimal, violence against women is far higher than in non-militarized societies. Race and gender intersect violence and harassment is directed at women, especially by nontribal members of the armed forces. Obviously in all these cases women include children as well. A third account (Haksar and Hongray, 2011) provides a case study on army rule in the Northeast. It focuses on the torture and violence inflicted on ordinary people by AR during a counterinsurgency operation code named ‘Operation Bluebird’ in 1987 in Oinam and neighbouring villages of Senapati district of Manipur. This was the response of the army to a violent attack on the local AR camp and arms seizure by an armed insurgent group. The NER: Vision 2020 document posits a participatory approach to development by involving the region in its economic and other engagements with the countries of Southeast

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Asia. The approach is important and relevant but the insistence on sticking to AFSPA could prove an impediment in shaking off the resistance of the people of the region to any attempts to promote happy relations with the Government of India. AFSPA has received considerable scholarly attention (McDuieRa, 2009; Kikon, 2009; Fernandes, 2004; Gaikwad, 2009; Navlakha, 2011; Barbora, 2006; Vajpeyi, 2009; Anderson, 2012; Akoijam, 2005). Vajpeyi (in Baruah, 2009: 39) is of the view that the AFSPA effectively creates ‘an entirely separate state within India, a sort of shadow nation that functions as a military state rather than electoral democracy’. Anderson notes the connection between India and non-India since ‘the hand of AFSPA has fallen where the reach of Hinduism has stopped’ (Anderson, 2012: 144). A legal luminary (Noorani, 2009: EPW, 22 August, pp. 8–11) has found the AFSPA unconstitutional. A former senior civil servant (Buch, 2010) has made a detailed case against the AFSPA and supported the use of the CrPC in its place. The Malom massacre by the AR on 2 November 2000 led to the indefinite fast by Ms Irom Sharmila demanding removal of the Act from Manipur. The fast still continues. The public support for the demand increased after the rape and killing of Ms Thangjam Manorama by the AR personnel on 11 July 2004 (see Chapter 2 for further details). However, the political constituency demanding the repeal of the Act did not prove powerful enough to succeed. An attempt to seek a judicial review of the AFSPA was rejected by the Supreme Court of India in 1998 on a case moved by the Naga People’s Movement for Human Rights (GOI, 2007: 236–7). The Thangjam Manorama episode was followed by an unprecedented naked protest by some Manipuri women in front of the AR HQ in Imphal. The existence of the AFSPA has undermined the role of the state police forces in the management of internal security and has also led to persistent civil society protest against it. The army chief General V. P. Malik, who had commanded an army division in counterinsurgency operations in Manipur, reportedly

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told the Manipur chief minister in 2004 that it was ‘either the AFSPA or no counterinsurgency operations’ (Raghavan, 2012: 12). Clearly, the military had a ‘rather expansive definition of what constitutes its ‘operational domain’, says the author (Ibid.: 14). Given the rigid stance of the army it was not surprising that the central government refused to disclose the contents of the Jeevan Reddy Committee report and ignored the powerful 13-year-long indefinite protest fast by Ms Irom Sharmila demanding removal of the AFSPA from Manipur. The Committee report has been subjected to clinical analysis by legal experts (Dobhal, HRLN, 2009: 204). Thus, the role of the AR and the AFSPA in the Northeast has been controversial. The MHA claim (GOI, 2011–12) that the AR is the ‘oldest paramilitary force’ under its control and provides it increasingly larger funds. If it is a force under the ministry, it seems arbitrary to place it under the ‘operational control’ of the army. It should be accountable to the MHA.

Chapter 5

Conflicts and the state Whither Northeast India?

The British relied on the Indian Army to quell the 1857 revolt. Attempting a cheaper substitute, they designed a police structure in 1861 based on the Irish colonial constabulary model. The inherited police system was rejected as having ‘lamentably failed’ to accomplish the ends for which it had been set up; ‘all but useless for the prevention and sadly inefficient for the detection of crime’; and ‘unscrupulous’ in the exercise of authority with a ‘generalized reputation for corruption and oppression’ (Kannabiran, 2004: 77). The 1861 police, a centralized paramilitary structure, had specific features (Arnold, 1986: 232–5): strict subordination to the civilian administration; increasing ties between the state police and the central government; expansion of the intelligence network and its secrecy and political importance; unaccountability to the public; coercive strength and disposition and frequent use of high levels of state violence; institutionalization of a paramilitary wing within the police structure; and close identification with propertied interests. The intelligence structure too had specific features. Created first in 1887 in response to the emergence of the Indian National Congress in 1885, it was formalized as the Intelligence Bureau (IB) in 1920. Its main job was to collect, collate and interpret political intelligence bearing on the security and stability of the State. It remains their basic regressive function today neglecting security of the people. Public order maintenance was the second priority of the Indian police and intelligence agencies. The investigation and detection of

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crime was relegated to the third position of priority and remain neglected even today. The suppression of the people was the primary goal of the British Raj. The Indian Penal Code (IPC) formulated in 1860 prioritized criminal conspiracy and ‘Offences against the State’ (Subramanian, 2007: 22). Prevention and investigation of fences against person and property, the common concern of­ of the police everywhere, were considered less important; the IPC deals with the subject only from Section 299 onwards. The obnoxious Bengal Regulation of 1818 was retained and the offence of ‘sedition’ was included in the Code in 1870. The Police Act of 1861 prioritized political intelligence collection and prevention and investigation of crime appears only in Section 23. The Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), 1861 has chapters on security for keeping the peace and maintenance of public order including use of force by the police. These laws were retained in independent India and were never changed despite the enshrinement of republican principles and democratic rights in the Constitution of India, 1950. The subsequent period has witnessed a proliferation of intelligence agencies and massive growth of centralized paramilitary police forces (Subramanian, 2007). The Indian police stand today as a broken system characterized by ‘dysfunction, abuse and impunity’ (Summary Report, HRW, 2009: 2). The ‘garrison State’ in Northeast India has included elements of the larger Indian State that have stood in the way of peace building. The democratic reforms initiated in 1972 could never be fully carried through. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in its successive annual reports recently has prioritized the challenge of conflict management in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, the Northeast and the Central Tribal Belt. A recent report (GOI, 2011–12: 7) claims that the number of incidents of violence and the number of ‘civilians’ killed had declined from 2009 to 2011 (see Appendix I, Table A1.3). Significantly, the number of ‘extremists killed/surrendered/arrested’ appeared high though the distinction between ‘extremists’ and ‘civilians’ was unclear: dead ‘civilians’ are easily treated as ‘extremists’.

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Assam and Manipur, claims the report, accounted for the bulk of the incidents of violence during 2009–11. The security situation in the former state improved in 2012 with talks occurring between the government and the ‘pro-talks’ Arabinda Rajkhowa faction of the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA). The ‘anti-talks’ Paresh Barua faction remained intransigent. Peace moves began with other militant outfits in Assam: United People’s Democratic Solidarity (UPDS), Dimasa Halong Daugah (DHD), DHD/Jowel (DHD/J), Kuki National Liberation Front (KNLF), and National Democratic Front of Bodoland/ Progressive (NDFB/P). Operations against remaining militant groups were suspended. A central government interlocutor pursued talks with DHD/J, DHD/N, NDFB and Achik National Volunteer Council (ANVC). The Meiteis in Manipur continued to remain the leading militant groups (see Appendix I, Table A1.3 for figures in brackets for Manipur and Tripura). In Nagaland, the Eastern Naga People’s Organization (ENPO), the apex body of Nagas from the four eastern districts, demanded a separate state within the Indian Union. In Meghalaya, suspension of operations was agreed upon with the ANVC. The entire state of Manipur (except the Imphal Municipal area) and Nagaland, Assam, the Tirap and Changlang districts of Arunachal Pradesh and the 20-km belt in Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya having common border with Assam had been declared as ‘disturbed areas’ under the AFSPA. In Tripura, a majority of the police posts and police stations (out of a total of sixty-five), either fully or partly, remained ‘disturbed areas’ under the AFSPA. The Government of India provided Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) to the states for counterinsurgency operations in addition to the existing forty-six Assam Rifles (AR) battalions, which performed both counterinsurgency and border guarding duties along the Indo-Myanmar border. The government of India provided intelligence and financial assistance for security operations. Funds were provided for raising fifty-one India Reserve battalions (IRB): nine each for Assam, Tripura and Manipur; seven for Nagaland; five each for Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram; four for Meghalaya; and

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three for Sikkim. A scheme for surrender-cum-rehabilitation of militants was in operation. Experts argue that official peace-moves and accords take place only after weakening or decimating militant organizations (Das, 2009: 232); this persuades them to accept the conditions that are laid down and helps government claim success in ‘re-establishing its command over the legitimate instruments of violence’. We now turn to an analysis of the current scenario in the conflict-affected states of Manipur, Tripura, Nagaland and Assam. In Manipur (population: 2,72,1756, Census 2011; Table I, Appendix A1.1), conflicts remain multilayered with the many rebel groups rejecting the Indian nationalist narrative as well as mutual counter narratives. Conflicts become intractable when the discourses are ‘reiterative and declarative’ and often repeat the same information or idea. This leads to rigid knowledge claims exclusive of one another among rebel groups. The dialogic approach, however, needs to ‘minimize stereotypes to overcome the boundary between ‘insider and outsider’. The role of ideas is significant in conflict transformation and attention needs to be paid to Manipur’s peculiar history with a fresh examination of its specificities as a ‘nation’ and polity (Phanjoubam, 2009: 147). The ‘grotesquely skewed model of development’ dominating political practice must be rejected. Conflict transformation is not just the task of social actors; State managers too must find better approaches. The Hill-Valley divide in the state and the Hill people’s rejection of the majoritarian project put forward in the Valley must also be addressed (Kham Khan Suan, 2009: 263). In 2009, an Independent People’s Tribunal (IPT) examined the conflict situation in Manipur with the participation of the victims of violence (HRLN, 2009). A call was made for the repeal of the AFSPA; prevent the misuse of other special security legislations; the independent functioning of human rights institutions; strictness and transparency in the enforcement of procedures of investigations; free availability of enquiry reports;

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prompt provision of rehabilitation and relief; human rights sensitization of paramilitary forces; and provision of legal literacy. Other points included (i) the situation of women’s safety and their ignorance of protective laws; (ii) need to strengthen the powers of human rights institutions; (iii) ex gratia grants to victim families affect the right to life and rule of law; (iv) need to strengthen civil police to deal with rape and murder cases in place of central security forces; (v) the 1997 Supreme Court guidelines on arrests must be followed; (vi) need to prevent misuse of arrest provisions to kill people; (vii) military authorities must report on their actions to civilian authorities; (viii) civil police should not be allowed to combine with the army to benefit from the immunity provisions of the AFSPA; (ix) mandatory recording of complaints from the public; and (x) fake police versions must be combated by cross cases based on true facts. The IPT stated that the AR personnel believed that since the militants were separatists, they could be killed arbitrarily. Ruling politicians believed that the AR and the AFSPA were needed to help them govern. The armed forces viewed the Nagas as ‘hostiles’, the Mizos as ‘rebels’ and the Manipuris as ‘insurgents’. They also viewed Manipuris as ‘extortionists’. Increasingly, civil police personnel were getting more brutalized and were killing innocent civilians. The IPT traced the root cause of extrajudicial killings to the existence of the AFSPA, which provided immunity to the armed forces: Section 3 empowered the governor to declare certain areas as ‘disturbed area’ enabling use of armed forces in aid of civil power; Section 4 gave them powers to arrest without warrant, enter and search premises, make arrest, open fire or use force to the point of causing death; Section 5 allowed arrested person not to be produced before the local police; orders under Section 3 were made non-justiciable; and right to remedy not available under Section 6. The IPT took note of instances of torture, extrajudicial execution and enforced disappearances perpetrated by the army and Manipur police commandos. The state government had shirked its duty to investigate such incidents. The

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illegal activities were being used as a smokescreen to perpetrate human rights violations. In July 2012, Neena Ningombam, Secretary of the ‘Extrajudicial Execution Victim Families (EEVFAM) Association of Manipur appealed to the Supreme Court of India to provide justice to innocent victims of extrajudicial executions by security forces and demanded independent probe into 1,528 such cases during 1978–2012 (North East Sun, 15 November 2012: 14). The figure included thirty-one women and ninety-eight children. In these cases, 419 persons were killed by the AR and 481 by combined teams of Manipur police commandos and central paramilitary forces. The state police forces, excluding central forces, alone had killed 344 persons in 2 years. In several cases eyewitnesses were present and testified that young men and women were picked up and gunned down. In response, the Supreme Court of India constituted a Commission led by a former judge to probe six selected cases (see Appendix V for ten serious cases). The Supreme Court appointed Commission of Inquiry found that in all the selected cases the victims had been innocent. In Tripura (population: 3,67,1032, Census 2011, Table A1.1, Appendix I)), though tribal resistance to Bengali majoritarian politics has been defused, a majority of the sixty-five police stations in the state are declared ‘disturbed areas’ under the AFSPA and deployment of state and central paramilitary forces continues. The primary cause of conflict is the loss of land by the state’s indigenous population to Bengali settlers. Other causes included the Dumbur hydroelectric project constructed on tribal lands, reducing the once-prosperous tribal peasantry to poverty. The economic viability of the project was questionable. The subsiding water level of the reservoir has opened up large tracks of fertile land for cultivation. The decommissioning of the dam needed to enable resettlement and rehabilitation of the displaced tribal population in the state and promote ethnic reconciliation in the state (Bhaumik, 2009: 293). In Nagaland (population: 1,980,602, Census 2011, Table A1.1, Appendix I) conflict emerged in the mid-1950s when it was part

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of the undivided Assam province. A section of the Nagas led by Angami Zapu Phizo demanded independence from India (Lintner, 2012: 38; Subramanian, 2007: 81). By late 1955, a Naga Federal Government was proclaimed. The decision to induct the AR/army into the Naga Hills-Tuensang Area (NHTA) was taken by Prime Minister Nehru (Mullik, 1972: 308). The decision, over-ruling the Army, the Governor of Assam and even the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), had far-reaching consequences for the Naga people (Rustomji, 1983: 22). Under the Commander in Chief of the Indian Army, ‘two divisions and thirty-five battalions of the paramilitary AR, largely a Gurkha force known for its cruelties’ (Anderson, 2012: 123) were inducted to suppress the rebellion. The AFSPA, with special powers and immunity to the armed forces was imposed. Lintner (2012: 38) has recorded the details of the Naga resistance and State violence. Nagaland was overwhelmed by the role of the ‘garrison State’. Though liberal rhetoric held that the Nagas had a right to speak for themselves, as a rule the Nagas were believed to be half-savage ‘junglis’ who were to be ruled and made into Indians, if necessary by force. When they refused to cooperate, the Nagas were hammered into submission. A strategy of concessions, share in power and funds to build cooperative elites was successful. Starting in 1955, the resistance in Nagaland continued as a low-intensity conflict. Formal negotiations for peace with the Nine Point Agreement of June 1947 and the Shillong Accord of 1975 followed. The NSCN (Issac-Muivah) emerged in January 1980 and another faction, NSCN (Khaplang) followed. The cutting edge of Naga nationalism was sovereignty and territorial integrity (Prabhakara, 2012: 248). The political map of the proposed ‘Nagalim’ included four districts in Manipur: Senapati, Ukhrul, Tamenglong and Chandel, which provided much of the initial support for the Naga insurgency. However, over the years, the demography of the homogeneous Ukhrul district claimed for ‘Nagalim’ underwent change and the government offered only ‘greater autonomy’ to Nagaland. Given the economic changes of the 1990s, there has been peace

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in the state. The NSCN gained from running a parallel government, collecting taxes and dispensing ‘justice’. The period has also seen the ‘the spread and consolidation of the presence of the armed forces’ with the presence of two Corps of the armed forces equipped with sophisticated weapons. A ‘non-territorial solution’ to the Naga tangle has seemed possible (Goswami, 2012) with the support of the Joint Legislators’ Forum of Nagaland. A new institution to take care of the interests of the Nagas spread over the other states of Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh and Assam appeared likely to emerge but the Eastern Nagaland Public Organization (ENPO) put forward a demand for a separate ‘frontier Nagaland’ or ‘Eastern Nagaland’ state dominated by the Khaplang group. This development complicates conflict resolution between the Meiteis and the NSCN (IM). Meanwhile, the Zomi Council, a Paite ethnic group, has proposed the creation of an Autonomous Tribal State (ATS) under Article 244A of the Constitution of India involving the creation of a separate Assembly for the Naga-inhabited Hill districts of Manipur (Naulak, 2013). The proposal is premised on the idea that ‘identity’ is not rooted in tribal or linguistic lineage. A shared historical identity of being a tribal from Manipur is postulated as the base for the ATS without any change in the existing territorial boundaries. This addresses to some extent the main grounds on which the Naga and non-Naga tribals in Manipur have sustained their militant political movements. The Naga-Meitei conflict has overshadowed the demands of non-Naga tribes such as the Kukis, Paites and the Hmars, who play an important role in the politics of Manipur. They have nine out of the twenty tribal MLAs of the state Assembly consisting of sixty MLAs, 40 of whom are Meiteis. Further, Manipur’s tribal people have been denied their constitutional right to govern themselves under the Sixth Schedule. The existing Autonomous District Councils and the Hill Area Committee (HAC) do not confer any real power to the people and are dominated by the bureaucracy (Bhatia, 2010:38). The proposed ATS could conceivably help other tribal communities in the

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region in overcoming the existing categories of mono-lingual, mono-cultural and mono-historical communities as the basis for the creation of new states. The ad hoc mechanisms of protest rallies and economic blockades fail to advance the cause of conflict reduction, peace building and development. In Assam, the most populous state in the Northeast (population: 31,16,9272, Census 2011, Table A1.1, Appendix I), conflict emerged when the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) set up in 1979, clashed with the Indian State (Mahanta, 2013). The outfit is today split into two factions: the ‘pro-talks’ faction (ULFA-PTF) led by Arabinda Rajkhowa and the ‘anti-talks’ faction (ULFA-ATF) led by Paresh Barua. The history of the ULFA is riddled with many ideological and political contradictions. The Rajkhowa faction is engaged in secret confabulations with the Government of India. The Paresh Barua faction continues with its demand for sovereignty, its leader living in the jungles of Myanmar. Rajkhowa has given up his quest for sovereignty. The Government of India appears to be in command of the situation. The ULFA opposed the ‘patron-client’ relationship between the Government of India and the state of Assam on the use of the state’s abundant natural resources in oil, tea, forests and water. The Assam movement (1979–85) turned militant in 1983 after the birth of ULFA in 1979. Its initial objectives were the detection, disenfranchisement and deportation of illegal immigrants and an end to Assam’s ‘step-motherly’ treatment by the central government. The commitment to armed struggle for sovereignty led to police repression. In its pursuit of political objectives, the ULFA neglected basic socioeconomic issues centred on land, water and forest resources later espoused by the Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) led by Akhil Gogoi, which became popular at the cost of the ULFA. The ULFA’s evolution went through several stages: emergence and growth (1979–84); stabilization and some initial populist actions (1985–90); state violence and military operations (1991–96); counter-violence by the ULFA (1997–2000); strategic and tactical changes in policy (2001 onwards). During

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the Assam Gana Parishad (AGP) government (1985–90) the ULFA expanded its networks and links in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Myanmar and Bhutan. Military actions under the ‘Operation Bajrang’ and ‘Operation Rhino’ (1991–96) led to training links with the Kachin Liberation Army (KLA) in Myanmar. President’s Rule in 1990 intensified military operations with huge impact in rural areas. Kidnapping of central government employees was a major militant action but heavy military and paramilitary deployment weakened the organization. Chief Minister Hitendra Saikia’s surrender policy for ULFA rebels led to the criminalization of politics and administration and the emergence of the SULFA (surrendered ULFA). People’s discontent with New Delhi provided ballast to the armed struggle. In 1996, the ULFA resorted to massive extortions and collection of ‘taxes’ from government employees, businessmen and industrialists. The government set up the Unified Command Structure (UCS) under the state chief secretary, which included the state Home Secretary, the DGP, the Joint Secretary of the Union Home Ministry and the Corps Commander (GOC) of the army. An Operational Group was formed including the army, the state police and paramilitary officials. Conflict of interest developed between the ULFA and the AGP government and an assassination attempt was made on the AGP Chief Minister Prafulla Mahanta. Violent incidents during 2000–05 witnessed the collaboration of the surrendered ULFAs (SULFAs) with army units leading to a series of secret killings of ULFA cadres. The cadres of the SULFA were increasingly used by the army in counterinsurgency operations. In one case, an army officer misappropriated huge funds recovered from the ULFA cadres. In the name of national security, the armed forces were allegedly silencing, brutalizing, maiming and killings ordinary people. The counterinsurgency operations under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) 1958 were unpopular. The SULFA cadres became part of every criminal activity in the state. The SN Saikia Commission in 2005 documented the extrajudicial killings by the SULFA cadres of the ULFAs, their family

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members and relatives. Its report contained an indictment of the role of the armed forces of the Union. The Unified Command Structure (UCS) was modified and the popularity and support base of the ULFA diminished. The decline of the ULFA resulted from indiscriminate killings; support to Bangladeshi immigrants; connivance with the Pakistani ISI; killing of innocent children in Dhemaji, 2004; support to Pakistan in the Kargil war, 1999; the killing of social activist Sanjoy Ghosh in 1997 and so on. The persistence of the ULFA is attributed to the ‘pride factor’; strong anti-India sentiment; low economic and human development in the state; support from external agencies; and linkages with international arms networks. The important issues that emerged were illegal migration, human development and the protection of the composite character of the Assam. Several civil society initiatives for conflict resolution emerged but were not successful. The ULFA was guilty of many excesses, contradictions and inconsistencies in policies, practices and demands. The present demand of the main faction appears confined to full autonomy within the Indian Union. The Indian army’s pacification campaign led to the ‘fatigue factor’. ULFA’s acceptance by the people declined. The Government of India’s counterinsurgency operations has been accompanied by some development concessions and autonomy measures. The Look East Policy (LEP) and the NER: Vision 2020 are contradicted by the repressive provisions of the AFSPA. The Bangladesh government arrested Arabinda Rajkhowa and Deputy Commander in Chief Raju Barua, along with eight other Assamese militants in late-November 2009 and handed them over to India. In September 2010, Rajkumar Meghen, alias Sana Yaima, leader of the United National Liberation Front (UNLF) of Manipur, was also arrested. Anthony Shimray, the main arms procurer of the Naga rebels was held at Kathmandu and sent to Indian custody. Paresh Barua, the ULFA Commander-in-Chief still remains at large. There are reportedly huge impediments to talks between the Government of India and Assamese rebel leaders. Both have adopted inflexible

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positions. The breakaway Paresh Barua faction has indicated that there can be no compromise on the demand for ‘Swadin Asom’. Further, powerful groups are reportedly interested in the ULFA continuing its struggle to ensure continued development support by Government of India indicating a ‘structural nexus between insurgency and development’. Overriding these concerns, there are genuine fears about the very existence of Assam given the recrudescence of many demands for the creation of other full-fledged ethnic states such as that of Bodoland. The continually fragmenting ethnicities in Assam have been sought to be neutralized by both central and state governments through the formation of successive autonomous district councils in an apparently endless process, which would surely have a backlash effect in the future following the examples of the Bodos, the Karbis, the Dimasas and others. The July 2012 attempted ethnic cleansing of the ‘immigrant’ Muslims by the extremist Bodos led to hundreds killed and thousands displaced. North Cachar Hills has displayed a similar tendency. The two factions of the Dima Hasao Daogah (DHD) led by Dilip Nunisa and Jowel Cardosa arrived at a settlement in October 2012 but not fully reconciled to each other. The latter, seemingly more militant, may opt for violence in future to push forward its demand autonomy or outright independence (Banerjee, 2012: 10–13). The situation in Karbi Anglong is causing similar concern too (see Mangattuthazhe, 2008, 2009 for Karbi Anglong and NC Hills respectively). The Northeast, ‘a beautiful but truly depressing corner of India’ (Lintner, 2012: 182), has become today a market for weapons of all kinds. A local ‘gun cultures’ has led to even ordinary people arming themselves for protection. Rebel forces in Myanmar connected to former Chinese army officers turned ‘private businessmen’ are involved in a thriving arms industry. Though in the 1980s the Chinese stopped helping Northeast insurgents, it is reported that clandestine purchase of Chinese arms is going on. Sana Yaima, a Manipuri militant, was arrested in December 2002 and the Myanmar officials were paid off. Sana Yaima

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returned to Kabaw Valley in Manipur ceded to Myanmar by Jawaharlal Nehru, an action still rankling with the Manipuris. The UNLF of Manipur grew from strength to strength through superior organization, propaganda and ‘tax’ collection. The cross border trade flourishes as reflected in Paona Bazar in Imphal. Insurgent groups collect ‘taxes’ on this trade. Sana Yaima was handed over by the Bangladesh authorities to the Government of India in 2010. The illegal economy of insurgents affects economic development in the region. Kidnapping for ransom; looting banks, siphoning off government development funds; and smuggling arms and narcotics from Myanmar continue. In Manipur, shopkeepers pay off several insurgent groups. In Tripura too, a similar situation is said to prevail. The illegal accumulation of funds is said to have contributed to the luxurious life styles of the ‘insurgents’. Corruption, failure of governance and a parallel economy driven by insurgents affect the local economy. Terrorism, drugs and arms trafficking, money laundering, cross border migration and ethnic conflicts have devastated the social fabric. Indigenous people who are exempt from government taxes share off their income with the militants (Bhattacharyya, 2011 cited in Lintner, 2012: 171). The protection of identities is central to ethnic groups across India. While many trends have promoted the ‘idea of India’, others have encouraged segmentation. Willingness to recognize and accept plurality and complexity are essential to prevent further segmentation in the Northeast (Prabhakara, 2012: 253–77). The attempt to set up a denominational state in Assam based on the Assamese language and culture following other denominational experiments in Nagaland and Mizoram and the assertion of Bodo and other identities may potentially lead to similar demands in the case of the Kukis, Karbis, and Dimasas of Assam. The Bodo agitation has become a template for six nontribal communities of Assam, classified as Other Backward Classes (OBCs), which demand ‘Scheduled Tribe’ status. These are the Ahom (also Tai-Ahom); the Chutia; the Matak (Motok); the Moran, the Koch-Rajbanshi (or Sarania Kachari); and the

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Adivasis (including ninety-six sub-categories) who constitute the third largest community in the state after the Hindus and the Muslims. The Bodo militants used the three components education, culture and politics to mobilize fellow Bodos in demand for Bodo separatism. In 1967, the All Bodo Students Union (ABSU) led by Upendranath Brahma became the architect of Bodo nationalist assertion. The creation of the Bodo Territorial Autonomous District (BTAD) was merely a transit point in the path to full-fledged Bodoland state. This issue was behind the violence in 2012 against the Muslim minority from across the Bangladesh border. The Bodoland agitation leaders share power with the Congress in the state but are divided on achieving their separatist aspirations. The Bodo struggle resembled the earlier Assamese nationalist struggle. This trajectory may prove the precursor of other identity assertions in Assam. Army deployment in the Northeast, highly placed intelligence sources reveal, consists of the Army Corps 3 and 4, located at Dimapur in Nagaland and Tezpur in Assam to meet external and internal security threats. Routine border guarding in Arunachal Pradesh is managed by the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP). The Border Security Force (BSF) takes care of the Indo-Bangladesh border. The Group of Ministers on National Security (2000) recommended that the AR should have exclusive responsibility for the Indo-Myanmar border on the principle of ‘one-border, one force’. However, a senior army officer has argued that the AR is not an exclusively border-guarding force since its personnel do not possess the necessary police, excise and customs expertise (Nanavatty, 2013:88); it is experienced in counterinsurgency operations. The guarding of Indo-Myanmar border, he says, should be with the BSF. A field visit to Manipur in 2009 revealed that twenty-seven battalions of the AR had been deployed in the state (DSG, 2009; GOM, 2012). A total of sixty battalions of the army, AR and central and state armed police forces were found deployed in the state (DSG, 2009). Other army sources reveal that two corps of the Indian Army are located in the Northeast in Dimapur and Tezpur respectively.

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They are essentially meant for external defence but participate in counterinsurgency activities. Each Corps has three Divisions; each Division has three brigades; and each brigade has three battalions. There are an estimated 15,000 troops in each Division. The 57 Mountain Division in Manipur perform internal security duties. Each Corps is commanded by a Lt. General and Division by a Major General. The AR, a central ‘paramilitary’ force, which performs counterinsurgency duties, is under the command of a Lt. General, designated as Director General. The AR functions under the operational command of the army and all its officers of and above the rank of Commanding Officers (COs) of battalions are from the army. The AR has two IGs of Major General rank. In all five divisions of the Indian Army and the paramilitary AR with forty-six battalions and a Mountain Division are said to be deployed on internal security duties in the region. There are in addition a number of CAPFs such as the CRPF, BSF, IRB and other forces, which are deployed in the seven states of the Northeast (excluding Sikkim). The civilian police forces in seven states of the Northeast have increased nearly four times between 1978 and 2012 (Appendix I, Table A1.9). Heavy deployment of security forces in the region has implications for the achievement of the expected peace dividends from the LEP and the NER: Vision 2020. The role of repressive legislations in India has been exhaustively analysed (Haragopal and Jagannatham, 2009). Several repressive special security legislations have been in use in the Northeast as well from 1950 to the present. These are: (i) Preventive Detention Act, 1950; (ii) Assam (Disturbed Areas) Act 1955; (iii) Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958; (iv) Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967; (v) National Security Act, 1980; (vi) Maintenance of Internal Security Act, 1971; (vii) Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Act, 1985; and (viii) Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002. The AFSPA has been the most controversial. A civil society initiative to resolve the Maoist violence in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh may here be noted for its possible relevance in the context of the Northeast. The Concerned

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Citizens’ Committee (CCC) in Andhra Pradesh made a sustained effort during 1997–2004 to initiate a dialogue involving the State and the Maoist insurgents. This was a unique experiment in the history of conflict dynamics in India. The CCC was a diverse group of fifteen members, formed to devise a possible civil society response to the serious situation that had arisen as a result of brutal police encounter killings and the equally brutal Maoist response in Andhra Pradesh. The efforts to engage the two parties simultaneously was meticulously documented by the CCC whose aim was to break the psychosis of fear arising from the cycle of violence and counter-violence in the villages of the state and to find a path to a democratic space in which the people could articulate their legitimate aspirations. The group travelled widely through the villages and met as many people as possible. It addressed both Maoist leadership and the government with a view to winding down the violence. It did not attempt ideological critiques of the Maoists or of the government. The idea was to initiate a democratic debate focusing on the aspirations of the people, their ‘right to life, right to livelihood and right to dignified and honourable existence’. The CCC tried to address the specific conditions on both sides, which had led to persistent violence. The creation of a broader political debate was the ultimate aim. As a result in 2002, the Maoists observed unilateral ceasefire twice for several weeks. The CCC’s final report in 2006 noted that the ‘reform-led market-oriented growth’ had led to processes of exclusion of vast masses. A small segment in power perceived any mass mobilization against the existing order as a serious security threat. In the mid-2000s, the reform agenda became more aggressive than before with little scope for imaginative State intervention. The CCC viewed violence as arising from a ‘political culture that dispensed with accountability and deepened impunity’ and said its agenda was about yielding democratic space to expanding ‘possibilities for political assertion by ordinary people. It was as much about restoration of rule of law as about urging a mature and humanized and accountable revolutionary praxis’ (Maringanti, 2010: 43).

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Though by mid-2006 both sides formally disengaged from the talks owing to the persistent mutual suspicion between the police and the Maoists about each other’s intentions and plans, the CCC clarified that (i) the Maoist movement is a political phenomenon and there can only be a political resolution with the participation of political actors with the necessary sagacity; (ii) the violence in the state arose from a cultural paradigm perpetuated in the administrative routines and organizational practices on both sides that are aimed at domination and not democratization; interventions had thus to be located in local specificity through local public mobilization; (iii) those who mobilize must articulate a long-term political agenda; and (iv) the de-escalation of violence can only be a means to democratization and political regeneration; it is not an end in itself but one point along a broader transformative agenda (Maringanti, 2010: 39). Maringanti adds that ‘from the perspective of a transformative agenda’ the very process leading up to the talks between the contending parties must be regarded as an accomplishment. He spelt out the lessons that can be learnt from the AP experience by those who wish to bring about peace talks between the Maoists and the government. The reports of the CCC, documenting its relations with the Maoists as much as with the government of AP are of historic importance. The Union Home Ministry, guided by the IB, was more inclined to deploy massive central paramilitary forces in the Maoist-affected states rather than seriously examine the recommendations of the 2008 Planning Commission Expert Group Report. Civil society groups in the Northeast could benefit from a critical study of the experience of the CCC in Andhra Pradesh and learn from it in instituting efforts to deal with the conflict dynamics in the region. A significant recent study (Mahanta, 2013: 251) has documented civil society efforts at peace building in Assam but it not only leaves out the rest of the region but fails to learn from the Andhra Pradesh experience. A policy of equidistance between the State and the militants adopted by the CCC in Andhra

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Pradesh may be relevant in the Northeast. In Andhra Pradesh, however, the dialogue process initiated by the CCC’s efforts could not reach consummation owing to the lack of mutual trust between the police and the Maoists. Perhaps the police and the intelligence agencies were primarily to blame. Extensive documentation exists of international experience in the area of conflict resolution (see Robert and Richardson, 2007; Wallace, 2007). We may note here that the concept of ‘Transitional Justice’ was pursued to deliver popular justice to victims of internal conflict at the grassroots level in diverse countries such as South Africa, Cambodia, Chile and Rwanda (Guardian Weekly, July 4 2014: 30–31) In South Africa, racial apartheid caused thousands of deaths and millions of marginalization. After liberation, South Africa’s first democratic government set up a truth and reconciliation commission (TRC) with Archbishop Desmond Tutu as chair. Tutu described the exercise as ‘an incubation chamber for national healing, reconciliation and forgiveness’. Sitting in the late 1990s, the TRC illuminated the horrors committed under white minority rule. More than 7,000 confessions and about 20,000 victim statements were made. The armed struggle by the African National Congress (ANC) was justified though other acts during the struggle were not justified. Nelson Mandela appreciated the work of the TRC though Mandela’s successors had failed to follow up. It was noted that healing was a process whose success depended on how the truth was dealt with after its telling. In Cambodia, the experience was that no justice had been delivered even after more than two million people had died. The extraordinary chambers of the courts of Cambodia (ECCC) since 2006 were plagued with charges of corruption, obstruction and interference; judges and investigators had resigned. Just one verdict had been produced in 8 years. During the murderous regime of Khmer Rouge (1975–1979), a large number of men, women and children were sent to rural work camps for ‘re-education’. When Vietnam liberated the

176  Conflicts and the state

nation, a quarter of the population had been killed. For many Cambodians, reconciling the past was impossible while former Khmer Rouge cadres still acted as government ministers and headed the armed forces. In 1997 with UN help, a hybrid court manned by Cambodians and international judges and prosecutors was established to try war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. The court’s slow proceeding meant that time was running out to deliver sentences. ‘What constitutes justice’ was the question facing the victims. Journalist Kate Hodal felt that the ‘farce and deceit’ were damaging and dangerous and laid the basis for ‘future instability and impunity’. Chile, during the 17-year rule by Augusto Pinochet, saw 3,000 people killed or disappeared and 35,000 tortured. A semblance of legality survived and kindled a national movement for reconciliation and truth. Today, though many former police officers are imprisoned, 350 human rights investigations remain open. The nation is ruled by Michelle Bachelet, herself a torture victim. Carlos Cerda, a judge who fought for victims of human rights abuses was nominated to the country’s Supreme Court. Pinochet’s successor, Patricio Aylwin set up a human rights commission in 1990. Thousands of state killings were validated. A secret intelligence squad was set up to capture the underground guerrilla groups seeking justice by violent means. But there was a quest for peace in place of the search for vengeance. The collective amnesty that Pinochet had granted to human rights violators was overturned and select cases were tried for exemplary punishment. Nearly 100 were convicted. Attempts to bring justice to Pinochet failed. He was released by the British government on medical grounds. A constitutional amendment in Chile provided him further protection. Pinochet spent his last years surrounded by lawyers and died a free man aged 91 without having been convicted of any crime. The 1994 genocide in Rwanda took 800,000 lives in 100 days. An experiment in popular justice in the form of village level courts known as ‘gacaca’ after the grass in which they were held, with locally elected judges heard over 1.9 million

Conflicts and the state  177

cases over 10 years. Trials were held in public and survivors were given a chance to confront the perpetrators in full view of their families and neighbours. Defendants faced penalties including life imprisonment and hard labour. Shorter sentences for confessions and prayer for forgiveness were allowed. It was noted that ‘everyday Rwandans needed to feel involved in the process’. It was a way of doing intimate justice to what was a very intimate crime. It was incredibly successful at coming to terms with very specific crimes committed in the communities. There was a lot more clarity about the past. The courts closed in 2012 but the process of reconciliation has continued informally. Nearly all the perpetrators convicted through ‘gacaca’ now live alongside survivors. Most communities are peaceful but people are still working through the issues raised at ‘gacaca’. Churches, micro-credit cooperatives and other non-governmental actors play an important role in facilitating reconciliation. But generally people are doing it for themselves. There were pragmatic reasons for ‘gacaca’. The official judicial systems would have been overwhelmed by the caseload. However, it was noted that there were limitations on the ability of the accused to defend themselves. There were many instances of intimidation, corruption of defence witnesses and judges; and flawed decision making by inadequately trained lay judges. Unlike South Africa’s TRC, which dealt with atrocities on all sides, the ‘gacaca’ focused specifically on the genocide against the Tutsis by the Hutu. There was also a Hutu narrative that was not genocidal but left room for simmering resentment, it was noted. The experience of village level courts called ‘gacaca’ to deliver justice in Rwanda appears particularly relevant in the context of the Northeast India not to mention Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) which is said to have witnessed the massive disappearance/killings of over 70,000 people in externally inspired as well as internal conflict.

178  Conflicts and the state

The setting up of multidisciplinary study-cum-action groups of civil servants, scholars and social activists as in Andhra Pradesh in India to deal with specific conflict issues in India’s Northeast could be useful. Dialogue process between State and non-State actors must include all stake holders. Wallace (2007: 2) goes on to note that even after the conflict is eventually resolved, the consequences of the violence and the wounds inflicted on the human survivors and the national psyche need to be healed and a reasonable degree of ‘closure’ should be achieved so that the patterns of political violence do not recur. He stresses the need for institutionalizing efforts to attempt a healing process. During periods of conflict, ‘closure’ should be clearly identified as a core element focusing on institutionalizing human rights, especially for State actors; other core elements are reconciliation, transparency and justice. Wallace observes that setting out the facts, opening available records and attempting to answer the questions of victims would provide a major impetus to the healing process. This promotes understanding as a first step to some degree of justice and the possibility of reconciliation. In political violence, excessive and clandestine means are sometimes used; security concerns often make the State response a mirror image of the actions of insurgent groups. Means that are illegal according to the Geneva Convention must be avoided. Developments in Sri Lanka during the recent period constitute a warning signal (see also GOI, 2007, 2008a, 2008b, 2008c). Grassroots efforts at reconciliation in India after the Gujarat carnage 2002 have been documented (Oommen, 2008). The role of the Indian State in conflict management in the Northeast has been controversial. The official policy of curbing pluralistic trends has led to demands from below asserting segmented identities leading to secessionist demands and armed struggles. The very tendency to assert unity from above has led to trends promoting disunity. Central policy reforms in India must include structural reform and sensitization of major policy instruments with special attention to appropriateness and adequacy; maturity and ability of

Conflicts and the state  179

policy professionals; and induction of interdisciplinary skills, knowledge, vision and expertise. India in the Northeast faces the need to reconcile national and regional aspirations with people’s aspirations for justice and a better quality of life. A change in attitudes and approaches together with structural reforms would go a long way in re-democratizing democracy in Northeast India.

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Appendix I: Tables

Table A1.1  Seven states of Northeast India: area and population Indian/state

Area (square kilometers)

Population 2011

Arunachal Pradesh Assam Manipur Meghalaya Mizoram Nagaland Tripura

83,743 78,438 22,327 22,429 21,081 16,579 10,048

1,382,611 31,169,272 2,721,756 2,964,007 1,091,014 1,980,602 3,671,032

Source: Census of India 2011 Statement 3.

Table A1.2  Representation of Northeastern states in Indian parliament Indian/state

Lok Sabha (House of the People)

Rajya Sabha (Council of States)

Arunachal Pradesh Assam Manipur Meghalaya Mizoram Nagaland Tripura Total

2 14 2 2 1 1 2 24

1 7 1 1 1 1 1 13

Source: Baruah, Sanjib, 2007, p. 7.

2007

46 (Manipur-16; Tripura-03) 466 (Manipur-137; Tripura-10)

1,561 (Manipur-740; Tripura-68) 4,318 (Manipur-2,112; Tripura-382)

2008

Source: Annual Report of Ministry of Home Affairs, 2011–12, p. 19.

1,489 (Manipur-584; Tripura-94) Extremists killed/ 2,875 arrested/surrendered (Manipur-1,443; Tripura-303) Security personnel 79 (Manipur-39; killed Tripura-6) Civilians killed 498 (Manipur-130; Tripura-14)

Incidents of violence

Head

Table A1.3  Incidence of violence in the Northeast

1,297 (Manipur-659; Tripura-19) 3,842 (Manipur-1,896; Tripura-307) 42 (Manipur-19; Tripura-1) 264 (Manipur-81; Tripura-8)

2009 773 (Manipur-367; Tripura-30) 3,306 (Manipur-1,626; Tripura-155) 20 (Manipur-6; Tripura-0) 94 (Manipur-33; Tripura-2)

2010

32 (Manipur-10; Tripura-0) 70 (Manipur-26; Tripura-1)

627 (Manipur-61; Tripura-13) 3,377 (Manipur-1,677; Tripura-95)

2011

Table A1.4  Incidence of cognizable crimes under the Indian penal code 1981 to 2003: Manipur, Tripura, India (per lakh population) State

Year

Murder

Dacoity

Housebreaking

Theft

Riots

Robbery

Manipur

1981 1990 2000 2003 1981 1990 2000 2003 1981 1990 2000 2003

8.66 5.44 9.08 6.28 4.53 5.77 9.59 7.96 3.32 4.14 3.64 3.19

3.73 0.44 0.5 0.13 7.79 3.37 1.16 1.13 2.13 1.31 0.66 0.52

10.49 2.23 1.13 0.25 6.14 6.38 2.22 2.16 3.36 3.01 2.04 1.71

15.34 8.22 3.10 2.85 41.55 26.8 7.43 5.23 22.99 15.52 10.26 9.04

46.52 15.73 8.83 10.5 116.56 38.48 9.21 8.65 61.6 41.73 25.18 23.88

11.82 8.00 3.94 3.06 20.26 19.51 8.96 8.59 16.11 12.15 7.83 5.58

Tripura

India

Source: Table 14: 1 of Vision NER 2020, Annexures, p. 204.

Table A1.5  Incidents of terrorist violence in NER, 2004–06 State

Year

Incidents

Civilians killed

Security forces

Manipur

2004 2005 2006# 2004 2005 2006# 2004 2005 2006#

478 (8.9) 554 (11.2) 418 (10.9) 212 (4.0) 115 (2.3) 71 (1.8) 5,333 4,938 3,844

88 (5.5) 158 (10.2) 73 (6.9) 67 (4.2) 28 (1.8) 13 (1.2) 1,609 1,554 1,059

36 (6.7) 50 (10.7) 27 (8.2) 46 (8.5) 11 (2.4) 14 (4.3) 540 468 328

Tripura India

Source: Table 14.1A of Vision NER 2020, Annexures, p. 201.

Table A1.6  Strength of police force in NER, 1981–2003 State

Year

Police per 100 sq. km

Police per lakh of population

IPC case per civil police

Manipur

1981 1990 2000 2003 1981 1990 2000 2003 1981 1990 2000 2003

31.5 50.4 65.2 61.3 58.1 79.4 130.3 161 27.3 34 41 41.4

4,990 630 570 550 2,970 340 360 510 1,310 1,400 130 120

1 0.5 1.4 1.3 1.3 1 0.7 0.6 2.1 1.8 2.2 2.1

Tripura

India

Source: 14.2A of the Vision NER 2020, Annexures, p. 202.

2004–05 5.89 6.81 1.81

2003 2004 2003 2004

Manipur

243 320 394 212

Incidents

128 112 50 51

Extremists killed 232 370 336 192

Extremists arrested

Source: Table 14.2A of Vision NER 2020, Annexures, p. 202.

Tripura

Year

State

Table A1.8  Status of militancy in NER states, 2003–04

27 38 39 46

Security forces killed

Note: Population projected according to the 1991–2001 decadal population growth.

29 66 76 53

2002–03 0 0.16 0.02

3 122 86

Arms ­surrendered

2001–02 0.12 0.14 0.02

Arms recovered

Source: 14.3A of Vision NER 2020, Annexures, p. 203, Statically Abstract India various issues.

2003–04 5.35 7.02 1.67

2000–01 0.07 0.14 0.02

2002–03 4.94 6.68 1.59

2000–01 5.08 5.41 1.51

Manipur Tripura India

2001–02 5.59 6.37 1.53.

Police training expenditure

Police expenditure

State

Table A1.7  Expenditure on police and training in NER, 2000–01 to 2004–05 (Rs crore per lakh population)

5 5 268 365

Civilians killed

2004–05 0 0.1 0.02

50 62 207 67

Extremists surrenderred

2003–04 0.08 0.16 0.02

Table A1.9  Police in Northeast India (total strength, 1978–2012) State

Arunachal Pradesh Assam Manipur Meghalaya Mizoram Nagaland Tripura Total

Population (2011 Census)

1978

2012

State Armed Police

Total police strength including State Armed Police

State Armed Police

Total police strength including State Armed Police

1,382,611

112

———

11,517

2,386

31,169,272 2,721,756 2,964,007 1,091,014 1,980,602 3,671,032 44,980,294

30,343 6,190 4,570 1,689 8,561 5,239 56,704

10,130 3,406 1,095 693 5,401 1,720 22,445

62,174 31,083 12,792 11,246 24,282 41,608 194,702

26,770 12,837 5,242 6,976 15,416 13,830 83,457

Notes: (i) Total police includes district armed reserves. (ii) In addition to the figures above in 2011, 46 Assam Rifles Battalions and 51India Reserve Battalions (9 each for Assam, Tripura and Manipur, 7 for Nagaland, 5 each for Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram, 4 for Meghalaya, and 3 for Sikkim (Annual Report 2011–12 of MHA, p. 25) are deployed in the region. Sources: (i)  National Police Commission Seventh Report 1981, pp. 111–2. (ii) Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPR&D), Data on Police Organizations, 2012, pp. 38 and 48.

Appendix II A and B

A.  The Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Powers Act, 1958 An act to enable certain special powers to be conferred upon members of the forces in disturbed areas in the state of Assam and the Union Territory of Manipur Be it enacted by Parliament in the ninth year of the Republic of India as followed: 1. Short title and extent (i) This Act may be called the Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Power Act. 1958. (ii) It extends to the whole of the state of Assam and the Union Territory of Manipur. 2. Definitions In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires, (a) ‘Armed forces’ means the military forces the air forces of the union so operating. (b) ‘Disturbed area’ means an area which is for the time being declared by notification under Section 3 to be a disturbed area. (c) All other words and expressions used herein, but Not defined in the Air Force Act, 1950, or the Army Act 1950, shall have the meanings respectively assigned to them in those Acts.

Appendixes 187

3. Power to declare areas to be disturbed areas If the Governor of Assam or the Chief Commissioner of Manipur is of the opinion that the whole or any part of the state of Assam or the Union Territory of Manipur, as the case may be, is in such a disturbed or dangerous condition that the use of Armed Forces in aid of the civil power is necessary, he may, by notification in the official Gazette, declare the whole or any part of the state or Union Territory to be disturbed area. 4. Special Powers of the Armed Forces Any commissioned officer, warrant officer, non-commissioned officer or any other person of equivalent rank in the armed forces may, in a disturbed area, (a) If he is of opinion that it is necessary to do so for the maintenance of public order, after giving such due warning as he may consider necessary, fire upon or otherwise use force, even to the causing of death against any person who is acting in contravention of any law or order for the time being in force in the disturbed area prohibiting the assembly of five or more persons or the carrying of weapons or of the things capable of being used as weapons or the fire arms ammunition or explosive substances. (b) If he is of the opinion that it is necessary so to do, destroy any arms dump, prepared or fortified position or shelter from which armed attack are made or are likely to be made, or any structure used as a training camp for armed volunteers or utilized as a hideout by armed gangs or absconders wanted for any offence. (c) Arrest, without warrant, any person who has committed a cognizable offence or against whom a reasonable suspicion exists that he has committed or is about to commit a cognizable offence any may the arrest. (d) Enter and search without warrant any premises to make any such arrest as aforesaid or to recover any person believed to be wrongfully restrained or confined or any

188 Appendixes

arms, ammunition or explosive substances believed to be unlawfully kept in such premises and may for the purpose use such forces as may be necessary. 5. Arrested person to be made over to the police Any person arrested and taken into custody under this Act shall be made over to the officer in charge of the nearest police station with the least possible delay together with a report of the circumstance occasioning the arrest. 6. Protection to persons acting under this Act. No prosecution, suit or other legal proceeding shall be instituted except with previous sanction of the Central government against any person in respect of anything done or purported to be done in exercise of powers conferred by this Act. 7. Repeals and savings (1) The Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Powers Ordinance 1958 is here by repealed, (2) Notwithstanding such repeal, anything done or any action taken under the said ordinance shall be deemed to have done or taken under this Act, as if this Act had commenced on the 22nd day of May, 1958. B. The Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Powers (Amendment) Act, 1972 An Act to amend the Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Power Act, 1958. Be it enacted by Parliament in the twenty-third Year of the Republic of India as follows: 1. This Act may be called the Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Powers (Amendment) Act, 1972. 2. In the Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Powers Act 1958 (hereinafter referred to as the principal Act)

Appendixes 189

in the long title, for the word ‘in the State of Assam and the Union Territory of Manipur’, the words ‘in the State of Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura and Union Territories of Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram’ shall be submitted. 3. In Section 1 of the principal Act, (a) In Sub-section (1) for the words, brackets and figures the Armed Forces (Assam and Manipur) Special Powers Act, 1958, the words, brackets and figures ‘the Armed Forces(Special Powers) Act, 1958 shall be substituted: (b) For Sub-section (2) the following sub-section shall be substituted namely: (2) It extends to the whole of the States of Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura and the Union Territories of Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram. 4. For Section 3 of the principal Act, the following section shall be substituted, namely: (3) If in relation to any state or Union Territory to which this Act extends, the Governor of the state or the Administrator of the Union Territory, as the case may be is in such a disturbed or dangerous condition that the use of armed forces in aid of the civil power is necessary, the Governor of the state or the Administrator of the Union Territory or the Central Government, as the case may be, may be by notification in the official Gazette, declare the whole or such state or Union Territory to be disturbed area. As from the commencement of this Act, the principal Act, as extended by notification of the Government of India in the Ministry of Home Affairs No GSR 1970, dated the 25th November, shall cease to operate in the State of Tripura.

Appendix III

Militant groups in Manipur and Tripura Major groups Manipur (1) UNLF (United National Liberation Front) Formed in 1964, it is the oldest of Manipur’s militant groups. Its leader, Rajkumar Meghen aka Sana Yaima, is a distant descendant of the ancient Manipuri royalty, but also a leftist revolutionary. Once allied with the undivided NSCN, Sana Yaima fell out with Muivah in 1990. The armed strength of UNLF is estimated at 1,500–1,700. It maintains a strong presence in the Imphal Valley and around Moreh on the Burmese border, and Tamu on the opposite side inside Burma. On 29 September 2010, Sana Yaima was arrested in Bangladesh and bundled off to India, where he remains in the custody of the Indian authorities. The UNLF refers to its army as MPA (the Manipur People’s Army). (2) RPF /PLA (Revolutionary People’s Front/People’s Liberation Army) Formed in 1978 and for many years the main insurgent group among the majority Meiteis of Manipur, its fighters were trained in the 1980s by the Kachin Independence Army, KIA,

Appendixes 191

in northern Burma. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, it also had a presence in Bangladesh. The current president of the RPF is Irengbam Charoen and the strength of the PLA is estimated at 1,500. It is active in the Imphal Valley and other areas inhabited by the Meiteis. It follows a revolutionary Marxist ideology, and in 2007, it entered into an agreement with the Communist Party of India (Maoist). The Maoists recognized Manipur’s right to self-determination, while the PLA pledged not to attack ‘the Indian proletariat’ in Manipur, i.e., labourers who have migrated from the plains of India. (3) PREPAK (People’s Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak) Formed in 1977, PREPAK is a revolutionary Marxist outfit. Since then, it has split into several factions all demanding an independent Manipur or ‘Kangleipak,’ which again regrouped and reunited to form just three groups. The combined strength of these groups is estimated at 600–650 fighters. Some of the factions are reported to have camps in Burma and Bangladesh. In 2008, another faction of PREPAK broke away and formed the UPPK (United People’s Party of Kangleipak) with an armed wing called KPA (the Kangleipak People’s Army). (4) KCP (Kangleipak Communist Party) Established in the mid-1950s, KCP traces its origin from the movement of Hijam Irabot Singh, Manipur’s first leftist revolutionary who had died in 1951. The KCP raised its armed units in the 1970s, but most of its leaders were arrested during an Indian government offensive in 2009 (‘Operation Grand Slam’). At that time, it had an estimated strength of 350–400 and was active in the Imphal valley and parts of Thoubal district. In 2010, a breakaway KCP faction led by Sapamacha Kangleipal formed the Maoist Communist Party of Manipur, a militant group that has led a campaign against ‘religion-based education’ in the state, forcing the closure of several schools run by Roman Catholics.

192 Appendixes

(5) KYKL (Kanglei Yawol Kanba Lup) Formed in 1994 by Meiteis who had in 1989 broken away from the UNLF, its purported aim is an independent ‘Kangleipak’ (‘Greater Manipur’) but it is reported to maintain links with NSCN(IM), which is active in the Naga-inhabited areas of Manipur (especially the Tangkhul-dominated Ukhrul district, where T. Muivah was born). It may have an armed strength of 950–1,000 with camps on the Burmese side of the border, opposite Moreh. It operates mainly in the Imphal Valley, Bishnupur and Thoubal, where it collects ‘taxes’ from businesses and individuals. It is known for violent campaigns against drug traffickers and even addicts, for imposing certain dress codes on women and for opposing all ‘foreign’ (i.e. Indian) influences on Meitei culture. (6) PULF (People’s United Liberation Front) A Meitei Pangal (Muslim) group, PULF was formed in 1993 following communal clashes between the Hindu-Meiteis and the Muslims, which began in Thoubal district and then spread to parts of the Imphal Valley. Its aim is to establish an independent Islamic state in north-eastern India, and to achieve that objective, it has reportedly established alliances with other Islamic groups in the region, among them MLF, the Muslim Liberation Front, MULFA, the Muslim United Liberation Front of Assam, MULTA, the Muslim United Liberation Tigers of Assam and ILAA, the Islamic-Liberation Army of Assam. It is also suspected to have links with Islamic groups in other parts of India, such as Harkat-ul Mujahideen and Lashkar-e-Taiba. However, its armed strength is limited to between eighty to a hundred men and several of its leaders were either killed or captured during government operations in 2008 and 2009. (7) Kuki Groups About a dozen different Kuki militant groups are active in southern and south-eastern Manipur. In 1987, the KNF (Kuki

Appendixes 193

National Front) was formed, demanding a separate homeland for the Kukis on both sides of the Indo-Burmese border, but it soon split into several rival factions. The combined strength of these groups is believed to be 500–600, the main one being the KNO (the Kuki National Organization) led by P. Soyang Haokip. The original KNF also exists as well as various groups such as KNA (the Kuki National Army) and KRA (the Kuki Revolutionary Army). The KNO/KNA’s relationship with other Kuki groups is described as hostile. On 29 December 2005, three Kuki rebel groups, KRA, UKLF (the United Kuki Liberation Front) and KNF-S (Kuki National Front-Samuel), merged under the banner of KNC (the Kuki National Council) to fight the KNA. (8) Other Groups Ethnically Related to the Kuki-Chins UKRA (United Komrem Revolutionary Army) was formed in 2004 and has no more than forty to fifty armed cadres. Its stated aim is to protect the interests of the Komrem community in Manipur. Similar groups with communal aims exist among the Hmars, such as HNA (the Hmar National Army), HPC (the Hmar People’s Convention – various factions) and the ZDV (the Zou Defence Volunteers – several factions). (9) Naga Groups: Apart from the NSCN (IM), there is also the much smaller MNRF (Manipur Naga Revolutionary Front), formed in 2008 under the leadership of Allen Siro and with the aim of saving ‘the territorial integrity’ of Manipur; and UNPC (the United Naga People’s Council), which was also formed in 2008 and consists of a splinter group from NSCN (IM). Its leader, SS Max, is also said to be in favour of ‘safeguarding the territorial integrity of Manipur’.

Tripura There are more than two dozen militant outfits in Tripura claiming to represent the tribal population or local political

194 Appendixes

interests. The most significant are the Tripura Tribal Volunteer Force (TTVF), the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT), the All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF) and the Tripura Liberation Organization Front (TLOF). The United Bengali Liberation Front (UBLF) claims to represent the state’s Bengali population. Most tribal outfits trace their origin to the former Tripura National Volunteers (TNV). The tribal groups want to deprive all Bengali settlers who entered Tripura after 1956 of their voting rights and restore land to the tribal population. The ultimate aim is to expel who settled in the state after 1956 and their descendants. Source: Lintner, 2012, pp. 328–333.

Appendix IV

Extrajudicial killings by security forces in Manipur: ten recent cases Case I Khumbongmayum Orsonjit aged 19 years s/o Imo, P.S. Manipur West District. On 16 March 2010, at around 8:30 am, Orsonjit rode out a scooter bearing registration No 8382 after informing his mother that he would be going to get his scooter repaired. At around 10:20 am his mother called him up over mobile phone asking him to return home and have lunch with his father. Orsonjit told his mother that he was in the scooter repairing shop and would be returning soon after the scooter got repaired. At around 11:30 am, one of the local boys informed Orsonjit’s family that Orsonjit was arrested by a team of police commandos from MG Avenue near OK Hotel. On receiving the information, Orsonjit’s family went to Imphal police station and made a verbal submission. The police officer on duty denied any report of arrest but he recorded the verbal submission. Thereafter, the family also went to Porompat police station and then to Police Commandos Complex at Minuthong. But they also denied any report of arrest. In the evening, Orsonjit’s dead body was shown on the local news bulletin ISTV while his families were watching the news. The next day, the family went to the morgue of Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) at Lamphel and confirmed the death. The family also found signs of torture on the body. Orsonjit’s left

196 Appendixes

fingers were badly broken and his right hand was also found fractured. Case 2 Yumnam Kumarjit (18 years) s/o Y Nupamacha of Irom Meijrao Makha Leikai, Imphal West District had been staying at the residence of his aunt, Yengkhom Abem Devi in Chandel District since June 2009. There he used to work as mason labour. On 11 August 2009, Kumarjit received a phone call from his elder brother asking him to come back to his permanent house. On 12 August 2009, Kumarjit left his aunt’s house for his permanent residence in a passenger bus. Kumarjit failed to return home. It was reported that District Magistrate of Imphal West imposed curfew from 2.00 pm on that day. His family tried to search Kumarjit through friends and relatives. But the family could not trace him out. On 25 August 2009, the family came to know that an unknown individual was killed in an encounter by a combined team of Manipur Police Commando and 4/8 Gurkha Rifles at Moirangkhong Pat and the dead body of the individual was deposited in the morgue of Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS), Lamphel for identification. The family went to the morgue of RIMS and found the dead body of Kumarjit. The family has every reason to believe that Kumarjit was arrested while he was on the way to home from Chandel and killed in an extrajudicial manner. Several bullet injuries and marks of abrasions were found all over his body. Case 3 Chongtham Umakanta (24 years) s/o Gunamani of Iroisemba Mamang Leikai, Imphal West District, on 4 May 2009, at around 9.20 pm, Umakanta went out of his house soon after receiving a phone call from someone. After a while, he came back home along with two other unknown men. Thereafter, he informed his family that they were going to meet Mr Chanam Nanao, a local man. It was reported that they had dinner in Nanao’s house. While, they were in Nanao’s house, a team

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police commando came and took the entire male folk out of the house. The police commando team tried to take away Nanao. But Mrs Gyaneshori, mother of Nanao identified Nanao as her son and tried to stop. Thereafter, police commando team started beating all the male folk and whisked Umakanta away without issuing arrest memo. The next morning, the family of Umakanta came to know through local newspapers that Umakanta was shot dead at Seilen Chingkhong near Seijang Village under Lamlai Police Station of Imphal East District and his dead body was kept in the morgue of Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS). Case 4 Mr Elangbam Kiranjit aged 22 years, s/o Ibohal of Thoubal Haokha, Thoubal District, Manipur. On 23 April 2009 at around 3.30 pm, Mr Kiranjit went out from home, riding his red color bicycle along with a rope and mobile phone (sim card no. 98564083346) to search for a missing cow at Thoubal Khunou Chingya, Heibiyai. But he did not return home. Subsequently the family was searching for him at the locality and within his friends circle. It was reported that he was picked up by the Thoubal Police Commandos near Thoubal Khunou Chingya, Heibiyai. On the following day, father of the victim went to the Thoubal Police Station and inquired whereabouts of his son. But he was responded negatively. Later, they came to know from locality that he was shot dead at Laikotching area under Lamlai police station. Case 5 Mr Nameirakpam Gobind @ Dhopa (25 years) s/o, Romen of Bashikhong Mamang Leikai, PO and PS Irilbung, Imphal East District and his cousin Mr Nameirakpam Nobo (27 years) s/o, N Basanta of Bashikhong Mamang Leikai, PO and PS Irilbung, Imphal East District, Manipur. On the evening of 4 April 2009, at about 6.00 pm Gobind and his cousin Nobo roamed out together for evening stroll. They reportedly had tea and snacks

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in a cafe known as Soro Hotel at the Bashikhong crossing. They did not return till in the late evening. Their family thought that they might have been participating in Thabal Chongba (community dance programme held in the Manipuri New Year). But they did not return home. Next day, the family tried to search them through friends and relatives. Later in the morning, the family came to know through local news bulletin ISTV that they were killed in an alleged encounter by Imphal West Police Commandos in a place nearby the Election Office along the road of the DC Lamphel. Case 6 Thoudam Shantikumar (23 years) of Kakwa Lamdaibung, Imphal west District On 24 March 2009, went to witness a function at the Manipur University. On his way to the university, he went to meet a friend at Naorem Leikai. But the friend was out of home. While returning from his friend’s place, when he reached Naorem Leikai Laishumang, a place between the community hall and transformer round about 11.30 am, he was picked up by the police commandos. The same evening around 9.00 pm, the dead body of Shantikumar was shown on ISTV new. It was informed to the family that the Police Commandos team with the Lamshang Police went towards Phayeng side then to Khunjao. On seeing a youth in the Police vehicle, the women folk of Tairenpokpi tried to stop the police team in order to save the life of the youth. But the police team forcibly rushed through. Thereafter, the police team took Santikumar down from their vehicle to the place where the police claimed to have encounter. There, he was dragged out and beat him up under a tree. Thereafter, he was shot two times at the thigh and killed. Case 7 Md Juma Khan @ Boy (22 years) s/o, (L) Md Samuwar Ali ofLilong Bazar, Thoubal District, Manipur, on 23 March 2009, at around 10:00 am, took a sum of rupees 300 in cash from his

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sister, Shamshed and went to buy some second hand clothes. But he did not return that day. Shamshed thought that he might be staying at his brother’s place at Lilong. The next day, Juma’s dead body appeared in the local newspapers. It was alleged that Juma was killed in an encounter by police commandos. Thereafter, Juma’s uncle Md Tomba went to the morgue at the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) at Lamphel and confirmed the death. Case 8 Mr Akoijam Priyobrata alias Bochou aged 25 years s/o Akoijam Rajen Singh of Mongsangei Boroi Makhong, Imphal West, on 15 March 2009 at around 3:00 pm left home riding his motor bike bringing a sum of rupees 7,000 approximately in his pocket. He informed his wife that he would be going to buy polythene packets used in packing pickle. He failed to return till in the late evening, his family called him up over his mobile phone but to no avail. The next morning, the family tried to call up him several time on his mobile phone but in vain. Thereafter, the family checked with the police stations of Singjamei, Imphal and Lamphel. Later in the morning, Lamphel Police Station informed the family that they had information of encounter killing at Langol and asked the family to check the dead body in morgue. Thereafter, the family went to the morgue of the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) and found the dead body of Priyabrata. Case 9 Md Azad Khan, aged 14 years s/o Md Wahid Ali of Phoubakchao Makha Leikai, PS Mayang Imphal, District Imphal West, on 4 March, 2009 around 11:45 am and his friend Mr Anand were reading newspaper in his house. Suddenly, some personnel of police commandos who came in three vehicles rushed towards Azad and started asking about his identity. Thereafter, the police commandos dragged Azad towards nearby paddy field. The family members of Azad tried to stop the police commandos

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from taking Azad. But, all of them including Anand were made to enter the house and locked them from outside. The family saw Azad being dragged through window towards nearby fields which is around 50–70 metres away from his house. Thereafter, the commando personnel directed Azad to run. The family shouted Azad not to run. As Azad refused to comply, one of the police commando personnel shot him down. Then the police commandos took away the dead body of Azad. Case 10 Naorem Robindro (27 years) s/o Naorem Shyamkishor Singh of Wangjing Hodamba Canteen Leirak, PS Thoubal, District Thoubal, on the morning of 14 January 2009, left his rented house taking a sum of rupees 35,000 in cash from the owner of his workshop to deposit it for renting a new shop to be used as their workshop at Khuman Lampak. He did not return to his rented house. Next morning, his family was informed that Robindro was killed by security forces in an encounter at Longa Koireng. Thereafter, his family went to the morgue of Regional Institute of Medica1 Sciences (RIMS) and confirmed the news. His family also alleged that Robindro’s gold ring, gold chain and newly bought second hand Maruti car 800 were also found missing. Source: Deepak Dewan, NE Sun, November 15, 2012, pp. 14–21.

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References 203 Delhi Solidarity Group (DSG), 2009, ‘Democracy “Encountered”: Report of a Fact finding Team on Manipur’, New Delhi, November. Dev, Bimal and D. K. Lairi, 1987, Manipur: Culture and Politics, Mittal Publications, New Delhi. Dewan, Deepak, 2012, ‘Resurrected Hope’, North East Sun, November 15, pp. 14–21. Dobhal, H., 2009, Manipur in the Shadow of AFSPA: Independent People’s Tribunal Report on Human Rights Violations in Manipur, Human Rights Law Network, New Delhi. Elwin, V., 1964, The Tribal World of Verrier Elwin, Oxford University Press, New Delhi. ——— 1997, Nagaland, Spectrum Publications, Delhi. EPW, 2006, ‘Maoist Movement in India’, Economic and Political Weekly, (Special Issue) XLI (29). Fernandes, W., 2004, ‘Limits of Law and Order Approach to the North East’, Economic and Political Weekly, 16 October. ——— 2008, ‘The Role of Land in Ethnic Conflicts in the Northeast’, in Search for Peace with Justice: Issues around Conflicts in Northeast India, edited by Walter Fernandes, North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati. Franke, Marcus, 2004, ‘Identity, War and the State in India’, PhD Thesis, University of Hull, UK (Mimeo). Gaikwad, N., 2009, ‘Revolting Bodies, Hysterical State: Women Protesting AFSPA, 1958’, Contemporary South Asia, Vol. 17, No. 3, pp. 299–411. Gan-Chaudhuri, J., 1985, A Political History of Tripura, Inter–India Publications, New Delhi. GOI, 1981, ‘National Police Commission Report’, Vol. 7. ——— 1997, ‘Transforming the Northeast: High Level Commission Report to the Prime Minster’, Planning Commission, New Delhi. ——— 2002, ‘India: Human Development Report’, Planning Commission, New Delhi. ——— 2005, Ministry of Home Affairs, ‘Report of the Committee to Review the Armed Forces Special Power Act. 1958’, www.hindu. com.nic.afa/ (accessed March 5, 2007). ——— 2007, ‘Public Order’, Second Administrative Reforms Commission, Seventh Report, New Delhi. ——— 2008a, ‘Combating Terrorism: Protecting by Righteousness’, Second Administrative Reforms Commission, Eighth Report, New Delhi.

204 References ——— 2008b, ‘Report of the Experts Group on Development Challenges in Extremist Affected Areas’, Planning Commission, New Delhi. ——— 2008c, ‘Capacity Building for Conflict Resolution: Friction to Fusion’, Second Administrative Reforms Commission, Seventh Report, New Delhi, February. ——— 2008d, ‘North East Region: Vision 2020’, Ministry for the Development of the North Eastern Region (DONER), New Delhi and the North Eastern Council, Shillong. GOI, Ministry of Home Affairs, Annual Reports, 2005–2006; 2008–2009. ——— 2011–2012, ‘The Northeast: Overview’, http://mha.nic.in/ (accessed February 26, 2013). GOM, 2012, Government of Manipur, Police Department, No. A-1/1/11-IGP (Ops)/8234, 6 March. Goswami, N., 2012, ‘Is Resolution Finally Here?’, North East Sun, 30 November. Government of Tripura (GOT), 2007, Human Development Report, Government of Tripura, Agartala. ——— 2012, ‘Annual Plan, 2012–13’ (Mimeo). Guardian, 4 July 2014, pp. 30–31. Haksar, N. and Sebastian Hongray, 2011, The Judgment That Never Came: Army Rule in Northeast India, Chicken Neck Publishers, New Delhi. Haragopal, G. and B. Jagannatham, 2009, ‘Terrorism and Human Rights: The Indian Experience with Repressive Laws’, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 44, No. 28. Hazarika, Sanjoy, 1994, Strangers of the Mist: Tales of War and Peace from India’s North East, Viking. Horam, M. (ed.), 2000, The Rising Manipur, New Delhi. HRW, Human Rights Watch, 2008, ‘Getting away with Murder: Fifty Years of the AFSPA’, New York. ——— 2009, ‘Broken System: Dysfunction, Abuse and Impunity in the Indian Police’, New York. Hussain, M., 2008, Interrogating Development, Sage Publications, New Delhi. Institute of Development Studies, Kolkata (IDSK), 2011, ‘Interim Appraisal of Tripura’s 11th Five Year Plan’, Executive Summary. Jitendra, 2013, ‘Two to Tango’, Sunday Statesman, February 24. Kannabiran, 2004, The Wages of Impunity: Power, Justice and Human Rights, Orient Longman, New Delhi.

References 205 Kham Khan Suan, H., 2009, ‘Hill Valley Divide as a Site of Conflict: Emerging Dialogic Space in Manipur’, in Beyond Counterinsurgency: Breaking the Impasse in North East India, edited by Sanjib Baruah, OUP, New Delhi. Kikon, D., 2009, ‘The Predicament of Justice: Fifty Years of AFSPA in India’, Contemporary Asia, Vol. 17, No. 3, pp. 271–82. Kipgen, Nehginpao, 2013, ‘A Cauldron of Competing Demands in Manipur’, The Hindu, 23 February, OPED, p. 8. Kumar, Kuldip, 2006, ‘Counterinsurgency Operations in Tripura Since 2000’, University of Leicester (Mimeo). Lintner, Bertil, 2012, Great Game: India, China and the Struggle for Asia’s Most Volatile Frontier, Harper Collins Publishers, New Delhi. Mahanta, N. G., 2013, Confronting the Indian State: ULFA’s Quest for Sovereignty, Sage Publications, New Delhi. Mahbub-ul-Haq, 1998, ‘Human Security and Governance’, South Asia Human Development Report, Islamabad. ——— 1999, ‘South Asia Human Development “Report” ’, Islamabad. Mangattuthazhe, T., 2008, ‘Violence and Search for Peace in Karbi Anglong, Assam’, North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati. ——— 2009, ‘Violence in NC Hills’, North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati. Manipur Human Development Report (MHDR) 2005, Government of Manipur, Imphal. Maringanti, Anant, 2010, ‘Talks between the Maoists and the State: Learning from the Andhra Experience’, Economic and Political Weekly, 21 August. McDuie-Ra, 2008, ‘Between National Security and Ethno-nationalism: The Regional Politics of Development in Northeast India’, Journal of South Asian Development, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 185–210. ——— 2009, ‘Vision 2020 or Re-vision, 1958: The Contradictory Politics of Counter-insurgency in India’s Regional Engagement’, Contemporary South Asia, Vol. 17, No. 3, pp. 313–30. Mukherjee, P., 2007, ‘India’s “Look East” Policy’, Dialogue Quarterly, Vol. 9, No. 1, July–September. Mukhim, P., 2012, ‘The Decay of Institutions’, The Statesman, 17 December. ——— 2012, ‘Nothing Like a First-hand Account’, The Statesman, 26 November. Mullik, B. N., 1972, My Years with Nehru, Allied Publishers, New Delhi.

206 References Nanavatty, Rostum K., 2013, Internal Armed Conflict in India: Forging a Civil-Military Approach, Pentagon Press, New Delhi. Naulak, Golan S., 2013, ‘Cutting through the Impasse’, The Hindu, 6 February, p. 11. Navlakha, G., 2011, ‘On Ending the War against Our Own People’, Economic and Political Weekly, 19 February. Nepram, B., 2002, Fractured Frontier: Armed Conflict, Narcotics and Small Arms Proliferation in India’s Northeast, Mittal Publishers, New Delhi. Noorani, A. G., 2009, ‘The Unconstitutionality of AFSPA, 1958’, Economic and Political Weekly, 22 August. North East Sun, 2012, Report on ‘Extrajudicial Execution Victim Families Association (EEVFA)’, Petition to the Supreme Court of India, 15 November. Oommen, T. K., 2008, Reconciliation in Post-Godhra Gujarat: The Role of Civil Society, Pearson-Longman, New Delhi. Pakem, B., 1997, Insurgency in Northeast India, Omsons, New Delhi. Palit, D. K., 1984, Sentinels of the Northeast: The Assam Rifles, Palit and Palit Publishers, New Delhi. Parratt, J., 2005, Wounded Land: Politics and Identity in Modern Manipur, Mittal Publication, New Delhi. Parratt, J. and S. N. Arambam Parratt, 1992, Queen Empress Vs Tikendrajit, Prince of Manipur: The Anglo-Manipuri Conflict of 1891, Har-Anand Publications, New Delhi. Parratt, J. and A. Parratt, 2003, ‘A New Beginning? Manipur’s State Elections, 2002’, South Asia Research, Vol. 23, No. 1. Paul, Manas, 2009, Eye Witness: Tales from Tripura’s Ethnic Conflict, Lancer Publications, New Delhi. Peers, Douglas M., 1995, Between Mars and Mammon: Colonial Armies and the Garrison State in India, Tauris Academic Studies, London. Phanjoubam, P., 2003, Bleeding Manipur, Mittal Publishers, New Delhi. ——— 2007, ‘Look East Policy: Beyond Trade and Commerce for Northeast India’, Dialogue, Vol. 9, No. 1, July–September. ———2009, ‘Northeast Problem as a Subject and Object’, in Beyond Counterinsurgency: Breaking the Impasse in North East India, edited by Sanjib Baruah, Oxford University Press, New Delhi. Prabhakara, M. S., 2012, Looking back into the Future: Identity & Politics in Northeast India, Routledge, New Delhi.

References 207 Raghavan, S., 2012, ‘The Civil Military Divide’, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. XLVII, No. 19, 12 May. Rajkumar, Falguni, 2011, The Rainbow People: Reinventing Northeast India, Manas Publications, New Delhi. Rammohan, E. N., 2011, Countering Insurgencies in India, Vij Books, New Delhi. Robert, J. A. and L. Richardson, 2007, ‘Democracy and Counterterrorism: Lessons from the Past’, United States Institute of Peace, Washington DC. Rustomji, N. K., 1973, Enchanted Frontiers, OUP, New Delhi. ___________1983, Imperilled Frontiers, OUP, New Delhi. Sachdeva, G., 2000, Economy of the Northeast: Policy, Present Conditions and Future Possibilities, Konark Publishers, New Delhi. Saikia, J. (ed.), 2007, Frontiers in Flames: North East India in Turmoil, Penguin, New Delhi. Sanajouba, N. (ed.), 1988, Manipur Past and Present, Vol. I, Mittal Publications, New Delhi. Sarin, V.I.K., 1980, India’s Northeast in Flames, Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi. Sen, N. C., 1959, Collected Works Vol. 12, Calcutta. Shakespear, Leslie, 1929, History of the Assam Rifles, Macmillan, London. Singh, M. P., 1988, ‘Reminiscences of the First and Last Chief Minister’ (Under Manipur State Constitution, 1947), in Manipur: Past and Present, Vol. 1, edited by N. Sanajouba, Mittal Publications, New Delhi. South Asia Human Development Documentation Centre (SAHRDC), 2005, AFSPA: A Study in National Security Tyranny, in Collected Works, Vol. 12, Calcutta. Srinivasavaradan, T.C.A., 1992, Federal Concept: The Indian Experience, Allied Publishers, New Delhi. Srikala, M. G. and R. Goswami, 2005, Women in Armed Conflict Situations, North East Network, Guwahati. Stewart, Frances, 2007, ‘Development and Human Security’, Tripura HDR, www.Preparingforpeace.org/stewartdevel.htm. Subramanian, K. S., 2003, ‘Globalisation and Development: Case Study of Tripura’, Institute of Applied Manpower Research, New Delhi. ——— 2007, Political Violence and the Police in India, Sage Publications, New Delhi. ——— 2010, ‘State Response to Maoist Violence in India: A Critical Assessment’, Economic and Political Weekly, 7 August.

208 References Subramanian, K. S. and Arvind Verma, 2009, Understanding the Police in India, Lexis-Nexis, New Delhi. ——— (eds.), 2014, Security, Governance and Democratic Rights: Essays on the Northeast, Niyogi Publications, New Delhi. Tripura Human Development Report (THDR), 2007, Government of Tripura, Agartala. United Nations Human Development Report, 1994, Human Security, New York. Vajpeyi, A., 2009, ‘Resenting the Indian State: For a New Political Practice in the Northeast’, in Beyond Counterinsurgency: Breaking the Impasse in North East India, edited by Sanjib Baruah, OUP, New Delhi. Verma, Kunal, Director General, Assam Rifles (DGAR), 2010, Assam Rifles: Guardians of the Dawn, Kaleidoindia Press, Shillong. Vohra, B. L., 2011, Tripura’s Brave Hearts: A Police Success Story of Counter Insurgency, Konark Publishers, New Delhi. Wallace, Paul, 2007, ‘A Grassroots Approach to Healing Terrorism’, in Democracy and Counter-terrorism: Lessons from the Past, US Institute of Peace, Washington, DC. World Bank, 2006, ‘Natural Resources, Water and Environment Nexus for Development and Growth in Northeast India’, Strategy Report, June 28. Zehol, Lucy, 2008, ‘Ethnic Tension and Conflict: North Eastern Experience’ in Search for Peace with Justice: Issues around Conflicts in Northeast India, edited by Walter Fernandes, North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati.

Note The Sino-Indian border dispute over the McMahon Line in the border state of Arunachal Pradesh giving rise to extensive militarization, has a bearing on the study of the internal conflict situation attempted in the book. My article “Looking back to the Future: The Sino-Indian Border Dispute (1954-62) explores the causes and nature of the dispute relating to the Aksai-Chin region in the Western Sector and McMahon Line in the Eastern Sector”. The article can be accessed at: http://atimes.com/2015/06/lookingback-to-the-future-the-sino-indian-border-dispute-of-1954-62/

Index

Abdullah, Sheikh 16 Achik National Volunteer Council (ANVC) 21 Agrarian revolt 102 – 8 agriculture 22, 30, 48, 125, 128 All Bodo Students Union (ABSU) 171 All Tripura People’s Liberation Organization (ATPLO) 115 – 19, 130 All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF) 119 – 21 Anglo-Indian Army 4 Anglo-Manipuri war 59 Annual Plan, Manipur 50 anti-imperialist war 31 – 4 Apatani operations 148 Apokpa Marup 44 apprenticeship 8 Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) 2 – 3, 5, 9, 10, 14, 15, 19, 21, 22, 26, 27, 29, 33, 52, 55, 56, 60, 62, 64, 71 – 5, 80, 82, 89, 143 – 57 Assam Act 152 Assam Gana Parishad (AGP) 167 Assam Rifles (AR) 2, 9, 20, 21, 29, 43, 47, 68, 70, 89, 143 – 57; deployment of 14 Assam Rifles Act 145 Autonomous Tribal State (ATS) 165

Barua, Paresh 166 Bay of Bengal Initiatives for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) 50 Bhaumik, Subir 140 Bikram, Bir 91 Bikram, Kirit 91 Bisheshar, N. 60 Bodo Territorial Autonomous District (BTAD) 26, 28, 171 Boycott Day 117 Burmese Chins 47 Cachar Levy 144, 148 Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) 2, 21, 24, 26, 29, 89, 160 central paramilitary forces (CPFs) 21 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) 21, 135 Chakraborty, Nripen 107, 133 Chand, Chura 31, 38, 40, 43, 44, 45 Chanu, Irom Sharmila 14, 33, 80, 156 Chatterjee, A. B. 103 Chaudhuri Naskar 96 Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) 112

210 Index civil society organizations 23 communist militancy 99 – 102 Communist Party of Burma (CPB) 66 Communist Party of India (CPI) 14, 42, 105, 106 Concerned Citizens’ Committee (CCC) 15, 172 – 4 conflicts: context and contours 1 – 15; dynamics 48 – 50; management 3, 12, 19; in Northeast India 16 – 28, 158 – 79 corruption 23, 49, 158 counterinsurgency 25, 134, 136, 145, 147 – 9, 153, 160, 172 Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) 159 Datta, Biren 94, 100 Deb, Dasarath 96, 102, 103, 130, 133, 139 Debbarma, Aghore 93, 95, 96 Debbarma, Kamini 123 Debbarma, Pronob 121 de facto martial law 153 democracy, decline of 52 – 5 demographic inversion 129 demographic transformation 94, 97 – 8, 127, 129 Development of the North Eastern Region (DONER) 11, 19, 24 Devi, Rabina 78 – 88 Dima Halam Daogah 26 Dima Halam Deogah 21 Dima Hasao Daogah 169 Dutta, Biren 101, 102, 133 Eastern Nagaland Public Organization (ENPO) 160, 165 East India Company (EIC) 4 education 30, 39 – 40, 46, 56 – 7, 95, 127, 129 – 30, 132 elections 30, 33 – 4, 48, 53, 91, 113 – 14, 117, 123, 131, 133 – 5, 137

Elwin, Verrier 7 ethnicity 12; ethnic conflicts 50 – 2, 98 – 9; ethnic groups 30, 50, 55, 57 – 9, 165, 170; ethnic hostility 55 Extrajudicial Encounter Victim Families Association, Manipur (EEVFMAM) 9 Extrajudicial Execution Victim Families Association Manipur (EEVFAM) 62, 163 extremism 113 – 14, 139 – 40 feudalism 44 First Women’s War 35 Five Year Plan 30 Franke, Marcus 2, 4 Gana Mukti Parishad (GMP) 92, 102 – 7, 109 Gandhi, Indira 17 Gandhi, Rajiv 118 garrison State 159 Geneva Convention 178 Ghosh, Ajoy 108 Gogoi, Akhil 166 governance, defined 6 Government of India Act 7 Gram Panchayats 53 Green Revolution 17 High Level Commission report 11 Human Development Report (HDR) 6, 129 human rights violations 9, 21, 31, 55 – 9, 68 – 71, 73 – 5, 78 – 9, 82, 87, 142, 145, 151, 163 human security 6, 55, 128 – 9 Independent People’s Tribunal (IPT) 161 India: garrison state in 4 Indian National Congress (INC) 91 Indian Penal Code (IPC) 159 India Reserve (IR) battalions 2

Index 211 India Reserve Battalions (IRB) 81, 160 India’s Independence Act 32 Indo-Burma Revolutionary Front (IBRF) 60 insurgencies, in manipur 65 – 8 insurgent groups 7, 59 – 62 Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) 140 Intelligence Bureau (IB) 2, 10, 16, 158 Irabot, Hijam 39 – 44 see also political radical Jadonang Movement 46, 47 Jana Mangal Samiti (JMS) 99, 100, 101 Jana Shikshya Samiti (JSS) 95, 99 – 101, 103, 104 Jawahar Rojgar Yojana (JRY) 140 Jeevan Reddy Committee 9, 88 Justice Jeevan Reddy Committee 10, 64 Kachin Independence Army (KIA) 67 Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) 59 Kangleipak Communist Party (KCP) 60, 83 Kanglei Yawol Kanna Lup (KYKL) 60, 83 Koloi, Manu 123 Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) 166 Krishak Sabha 45 Kuki Ethnic Movement 46 Kuki Liberation Army (KLA) 83 Kuki-Naga ethnic conflict 52, 55 Kuki National Army (KNA) 83 Kuki National Front (KNF) 83 Kuki National Organization (KNO) 60, 63, 65 Kuki rebellion 55

Kuki Revolutionary Army (KRA) 83 Kukis 47 Land Reforms Act of 1960 130 Look East Policy (LEP) 3, 13, 19, 22, 50, 145, 168 Lushai Hills 7 Mahbub-ul-Haq 129 Malik, V. P. 156 Manikya, Bir Chandra 94 Manipur: AFSPA in 71 – 5; anti-imperialist war 31 – 4; case study 29 – 88; conflicts dynamics 48 – 50; Congress 33; democracy, decline of 52 – 5; ethnic conflicts 50 – 2; fragmented politics of 33; hills of 46 – 7; history of 31; human rights violations 55 – 9, 68 – 71; insurgencies in 32, 65 – 8; insurgent groups 59 – 62; Meitei militancy 64 – 5; militarization of 69; Naga-Kuki ethnic conflict 62 – 3; NagaMeitei ethnic conflict 63 – 4; Nikhil Manipuri Mahasabha 44 – 6; Rabina Devi and Sanjit Meitei case 78 – 88; second women’s war 34 – 8; Thangjam Manorama case 75 – 8 Manipur Congress party 57 Manipur Constitution Act 52 Manipur (Hill Areas) District Councils Act 54 Manipur Human Development Report (MHDR) 50, 52, 56 Manipur Human Rights Commission (MHRC) 56 Manipur Krishak Sabha (MKS) 41, 45 Manipur People’s Army (MPA) 67 Manipur Praja Sangha (MPS) 41, 45 Manipur Rifles (MR) 81 Manipur State Durbar (MSD) 43 Manorama, Thangjam 75 – 8 Maoist conflict 15

212 Index Marwari traders 36 – 7, 42 Marxist–Leninist ideology 42 mass political consciousness 94 Meghen, Rajkumar 59 Meira Paibis 56 Meitei, Sanjit 78 – 88 Meitei ‘insurgency’ movements 45 Meitei militancy 64 – 5 militancy 132 military modernization 5 military promenade 46 mindless repression 62 Ministry for the Development of the Northeastern Region (DONER) 2 Ministry of Defence (MoD) 2, 5, 19 Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) 10, 18 Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) 1, 2, 16 Mishimi operations 148 Muivah, T. 34 Mullik, B. N. 10, 16, 18 Naga Ceasefire Agreement 34 Naga Hills 5, 7, 16, 17 Naga Hills-Tuensang Area (NHTA) 164 Naga insurgency 10 Naga-Kuki ethnic conflict 62 – 3 Naga-Meitei ethnic conflict 14, 29, 63 – 4 Nagas 47, 58 National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) 21, 26 National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) 119 – 21, 134 National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) 10, 21, 26, 58, 59, 63, 65, 165 Nayar, V. K. 60 Nehru, Jawaharlal 18 Nikhil Hindu Manipur Mahasabha (NHMM) 40, 44, 45 Nikhil Manipuri Mahasabha (NMM) 39, 40, 41, 44 – 6 Nine Point Agreement 164 Ningombam, Neena 9

nontribal migration 98 – 9 North-Eastern Areas (Reorganization) Act 28 North Eastern Council (NEC) 2, 24, 25 North East Frontier Agency (NEFA) 28, 150 North East Region (NER) Vision 2020 policy 3, 13, 14, 19, 20, 27, 145, 155 Nunisa, Dilip 169 Padmanabhiah Committee 23, 24, 26 Pakem, B. 7 Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) 53 parliamentary communism 108 – 9 People’s Education Movement 130 People’s Liberation Army (PLA) 59, 60, 61, 66, 67 People’s Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK) 60, 66 Phanjoubam, Pradip 12 Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI) 129 political leadership 12 political radical 39 – 44 Praja Sabha 45 Rajeshwar Rao line 106 Rajkhowa, Arabinda 166 Ramesh, Jairam 12 Reang Rebellion 92 – 3, 100 reciprocal violence, cycle of 7 Revolutionary Government of Manipur (RGM) 59 Revolutionary People’s Front (RPF) 66 Roy, Burman 6 Roy, Probhat 102 Rustomji, Nari 10, 17 Sadder Panchayat Court 40, 41 Samarendra, Arambam 67 Sanamahi Movement 44 SARC report 25, 26 – 7 Sarin, V. I. K. 49

Index 213 Sarkar, Manik 139 Second Administrative Reforms Commission (SARC) 23 Second Women’s War 9, 34 – 8, 149 security forces 7, 134 – 6 security-related expenditure (SRE) 148, 151 Sen, Nabin Chandra 94 Sena, Tripura 112 Sengkrak 91, 130 Sharma, Atombapu 44 Shukla, S. P. 11 Shukla Commission report 11 Simon Commission 100 Singh, Hijam Irabot 61, 65 Singh, Maharajkumar Priyabroto 46 Singh, M. K. P. 60 Singh, Okram Ibobi 34 SN Saikia Commission 167 Somerendra, Arambam 59 Somorendro, Sougaijam 39 – 40 special security legislations 172 state development record 127 – 9 State of Mizoram Act 28 State of Nagaland Act 28 state response, Tripura 123 – 5 The Statesman (newspaper) 105 surrender-cum-rehabilitation policy 51 Todd, H. J. 93 Transfer of Power 4 Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TAADC) 90, 91, 137, 139 tribal ethnic leadership 14 tribal resistance 121 – 3, 131 – 4 Tripura: Agrarian revolt 102 – 8; All Tripura People’s Liberation Organization 115 – 19; All Tripura Tiger Force 119 – 21; case study 89 – 142; communist militancy 99 – 102; ethnic conflict 98 – 9; left front government 125 – 7; militancy 136 – 8; National Liberation Front of Tripura 119 – 21;

nontribal migration 98 – 9; parliamentary communism 108 – 9; Reang Rebellion 92 – 3; renaissance 95; security forces 134 – 6; state response 123 – 5; state response, assessment 139 – 42; tribal resistance 121 – 3, 131 – 4; tribal unrest 94 – 8; Tripura Upajati Juba Damiti 109 – 12 Tripura National Volunteers (TNV) 112 – 15 Tripura Proja Mondal (TPM) 95 – 6, 100, 101, 103 Tripura State Rifles (TSR) 134, 139 Tripura State Security Act 105 Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC) 123, 127 Tripura Upajati Juba Samiti (TUJS) 107, 109 – 12, 130 Tulachandra, R. K. 60 UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) 154 United Bengali Liberation Front (UBLF) 122 United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) 10, 67, 159, 166, 168 United National Liberation Front (UNLF) 10, 59, 60, 61, 66, 83, 168 United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) 6, 25, 129 United People’s Front (UPF) 65 Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) 60, 134, 154 violence 6; state and non-State 7 see also conflicts World Bank 11 Zilla Parishads 53