The Naga Revolt

By GEORGE PATTERSON

WI 'm Indian prestige and influence deteriorating along the Himalayan border

China has launched a proposal for a 'Confedera- tion of Himalayan States'—to include Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, the North-East Frontier Area and Nagaland--which is having widespread acceptance.

The most interesting part of this proposal is the offer to include Nagaland, as this is the first official sign of China's interest in this Hima- layan people, who have been at war with India now for seven years, and it raises the intriguing question—will Nagaland become an Indian State or a Chinese Province? For the Indian Govern- ment have a Bill on the current agenda of Parliament to make Nagaland India's sixteenth State, while a delegation of the bitterly opposed 'rebel' or 'patriot' Nagas, who have successfully withstood an Indian attempts at domination, w as on Tuesday allowed to enter the UK to protest against India's militarily-enforced annexation of their territory. If they fail here and at the UN they say they will turn to China for help. If they are forced into this unwanted decision by Indian military pressure and Western unconcern it will be a greater tragedy for India and the West than the loss of Tibet, for it w ill bring China right on to the plains of India at her most strategic—and weakest—point.

There is no simple explanation of 'the Naga problem,' either in its genesis, in its growth, or in its possibly catastrophic implications. The Nagas are only one group of several tribes scat- tered along India's north-eastern frontier, be- tween Bhutan, Tibet and Burma. The Nagas themselves have no common boundary with 'the Tibet region of China,' but they have with Burma, and in the tangle of jungles, 10,000-foot Himalayan mountains and associated tribes- assOciated by Mongolian extraction and common hatred of India—it would not be difficult for them to establish contact with the Chinese occu- pation forces only one hundred miles to the north once the desire to do so was expressed on both sides.

There are approximately one million Nagas, scattered through sixteen different tribes, and some of these are 'subject Nagas' and some are 'free Nagas.' This is only the beginning of the confusion which bedevils the Naga problem. For the 'subject Nagas' are those who came under Britain's jurisdiction after military annexation of this limited part of the Naga territory in 1879, while the 'free Nagas' are those who continued to roam the adjoining territory outside of any- one's jurisdiction.

But between 1929, when the Simon Com- mission visited India to investigate Indian Con- stitutional Reform, and 1947, when India gained its independence, the representatives of both the 'subject Nagas' and 'free Nagas' demanded to be left out of any arrangement with India, as they were not Indians. It is important to recall that the Indian Congress leaders supported the 1930s Naga revolt against Britain, with Mr. Nehru at that time sending encouraging messages to the Naga woman leader of the revolt, Gaidiliu. But the NagasL-including the legendary Gaidi- liu, who, still alive, recently refused an invita- tion to go to Delhi because of India's actions against the Nagas in recent years—wanted the Indians even less than they wanted the British.

However, while some were in favour of complete independence immediately, others supported a proposal for a Ten-Year Agreement with India, and a majority of these 'moderates' on the Naga National Council (the Naga policy-making body based on their village and tribal councils), voted in favour of this approach. On February 2, 1947, the Naga National Council formally demanded an interim government 'for a period of ten years to the Nagas (British subject Nagas) and to make provisions for running it, at the end of which the Nagas will choose their own form of government.'

The preamble to the Agreement stated :

That the right of the Nagas to develop them- selves according to their freely expressed wishes is recognised....

The general principle is accepted that what the Naga National Council is prepared to pay for, the Naga National Council should control. This principle will apply equally to the work done as well as staff employed. ...

Judiciary, Agriculture, CWD, Tax, Education SPECTATOR, SEPTEMBER 14, 1962 and Legislature all came under the supervision and control of the Naga National Council, in the provisional terms of the Ten-Year Agreement, with Indian approval. But the negotiations broke down over 'Clause Nine.' Since this expresses the mutual objections which led to the revolt, and persist to the present irreconcilable positions, I will quote it in full: The Governor of Assam. as the Agent of the Indian Union, will have a special responsibility for a period of ten years to ensure the due observance of the agreement; at the end of this period the Naga National Council will be asked whether the above agreement is to be extended for a further period or a new agreement regard- ing the future of the Naga people arrived at. This was an acceptable basis for discussion to some of the Nagas, but in conversation with Indian leaders they were given to understand that what it actually implied was that they would always remain in some form of association with the Indian Union. This came as a shock to the moderates who had accepted the Agreement in all sincerity as envisaging ultimate Naga inde- pendence, and they construed this ambiguity as a deliberate Indian plot to enslave them. At a special meeting of the Naga National Council it was decided to approach Mahatma Gandhi, and appeal to him, and a nine-man delegation went to Delhi on July 19, 1947. Gandhi at first tried to persuade the Naga delega- tion to join the Indian Union, and promised them that India would never use force against them as they feared, but when they were still sus- picious, he finally stated: Nagas have every right to become indepen- dent. We did not want to live under the domina- tion of the British and they are now leaving I want you to feel that India is yours, that this city of Delhi is yours. I feel that Naga Hills is mine just as much as it is yours. But if You say that it is not mine, the matter must stop there. I believe in the brotherhood of mall, hut I do not believe in force and forced unions. If you do not wish to join the Union of India nobody will force you to do that.. .. I will ask them to shoot me first before one Naga is shot.

No agreement was reached, and on August 14,

1947, the Naga National Council proclaimed the independence of Nagaland.

Because it was not a major problem to India at that time—the area was remote, the people obscure (although Ptolemy had written of Naps 'the naked people'—in the third century)--the Indian Government made leisurelya o_ers, the Nagas rejected them; India built hospitals, roads and schools, the Nagas would not use them; India sent out administrators and armed police, the Nagas would not obey them. In short, for several years the Nagas—former head-hunters, but after a century of Baptist preaching over 60 per cent. Christian—practised India's ovvn passive resistance against India at, ironically, Gandhi's request. In 1955 the patience of the Nagas ended and fighting began. There had been several incidents, accusations of rape, brutalities and murder against the Indians by the Nagas, appeals to the United Nations which went unattended, and ail this, with a final episode when the Indians rub- tidy dishonoured two highly respected Naga chiefs by exposing their dead bodies in a p ubl ic square, sparked the Nagas into revolt. From that time—the famous siege of Kohima in 1956, when the Indians were almost defeated by the Nagas-

there has been an increasing and bitter war.

India, shaken by the near defeat of the Assam Rifles, sent in regular units of the army—Gur- khas and Sikhs—and as the fighting has increased in severity and scope these have been reinforced until there are now 40,000 regular Indian Army troops, according to Indian official sources. The Nagas claim, however, that this is a gross underestimate and that the total Indian personnel—troops, armed police and civilian administration under military supervision—is nearer 200,000-

From 1956 the Indian Government has refused Permission to all journalists—Western and Indian—to visit the area. An Indian-escorted press party was allowed to go to Kohirna, on the outskirts of Nagaland, in January, 1961, but it was strictly supervised in regard to movement and contacts. The only sources of informa- tion are the rare official statements from New Delhi—based upon biased reports of feuding military and political administrators—and the remarkably plentiful statements issued by the Naga National Council and the 'Federal Govern- ment of Free Nagaland,' the name by which the rebel, or patriot, government is known.

India has sought to win support for its policies among Nagas by creating and favouring a 'Naga People's Convention.' But this is still an empty facade, with unknown support, if any, from the Nagas, for all its activities to date have been carried out under the protection and supervision of the Indian Army and they have never been elected to office, only appointed by India. The members have no means whereby any 'agreements' can be implemented other than by the military imposition of the Indian Army. And even this puppet body, as recently as January of this year, was on the point of dissolution because more than half of them wanted to have talks with the 'rebels' to decide on the future of the Nagas.

In 1959 the leader of the Naga National Conneil--the Naga-elected body outlawed by the Indian Government as 'extremisr—disappeared, according to Indian reports, then turned up in England. He is Mr. A. Z. Phizo, and he claimed that he has come to appeal to Britain as a former friendly conqueror and ally (the Nagas had made a. magnificent contribution to winning the war In I3urma) to help them in putting a stop to the killings and atrocities committed by the Indian ArmY, and to protest at India's continued mili- tarY occupation of Naga territory against the Will of the Naga people, and for an independent and impartial investigation of his claims and ?barges. He claimed that since fighting began 1,11 1.955, 70,000 Nagas had been killed, over '00,000 were in concentration camps, 500 villages and 150 churches had been destroyed. f Then, because he felt he was not getting help ha.st enough alone, he sent for some Nagas to join as a delegation before he went on to the ika-Inited Nations. On May 1, a company of 153 _e4vilY armed Nagas dramatically made their ewaY through the Indian Army into Pakistan to ,rshenrt the members of this delegation to safety. c e delegation consists of 'General' Kaito, the ,..?Inniarider-in-Chief of the 'patriot' Naga Army mw'altned to be 40,000 strong), a regional corn- rider, and two Cabinet Ministers. After "g ht travel document difficulties with the Home

Office, they are now in London, where they will make the Naga case against India known and then proceed to the UN to lay charges against India there.

Mr. Phizo is naturally vexed by the wide- spread impression that the Nagas are a naked, savage, head-hunting, colourful tribe of dancers, which New Delhi perpetuates, for he points out that not only are they mostly Christian, but they are highly literate from a mission-school education, they have 160 university graduates, they have thirteen Nagas doing post-graduate work in the United States at present—including a research scientist—and a Naga has even cap- tained India's Olympic football team!

Under the continuing pressure of the revolt India has been forced to give a large measure of autonomy to the Nagas, and two Bills are in the course of being passed in the Indian Parlia- ment. But the circumstances in which these Bills have been introduced and their implica- tions, are not going to satisfy any Nagas. In the first place all 'talks' have been between India and a minority of Indian-sponsored and unrepresentative Nagas, chosen for their willing- ness to work with India—which makes them

unacceptable to Nagas. Then, the provisions of the Bills will be unacceptable even to this puppet administration, according to their own recent public statements, for they still put finance and law and order in India's hands. The only solu- tion with a chance of success is for India to permit the two representative groups of Nagas to meet to decide their own future.

It is difficult to see what new political solution India can provide in these circumstances, for to date she has stubbonly refused to deal with, or even meet, the 'extremists.' and it is to be feared that what the new militant Delhi has in mind is an all-out military operation along the same lines as Goa in order to release the heavy concentration of Indian troops in Nagaland for action elsewhere on the border.

But instead of releasing Indian troops to fight Chinese in other parts of the Himalayan border this kind of policy is only more likely to bring Chinese in—at the invitation of this embittered and frustrated border people. And, unlike Goa, in Nagaland the terrain is different, the opposi- tion is different and the Nagas' possible protec- tors are different—for China is not decadent or distant, and is certainly not uninterested.