Kaka D. Iralu
The Armed Forces profession is one of the noblest professions in the world. In this profession, every soldier swears an oath of allegiance to the nation that they would risk even their own lives towards safeguarding and defending the citizens of the nation and its territories from any external aggression.
In short, an army is instituted by a government to defend its citizens and the country from external aggression. But in the case of The Armed Forces Special Powers Act of 1958, the Indian government has instituted an act which shields its armed forces in such a manner where they can wage war against their own countryman with total immunity and impunity. This is a case where both the Indian government and its armed forces are guilty of doing just the opposite of what they are elected and appointed to do. On the Indian government side, instead of promulgating laws for the protection of its citizens, the government has sanctioned the army to shoot its own citizens even on mere suspicion. On the other hand, instead of defending the country’s citizens from external aggression, the army is on the contrary, internally empowered to kill even their own citizens under the protection of the AFSPA.
The AFSPA therefore, nullifies the very dignity and honor of the military profession by transforming the army into a killing machine that can kill even on mere suspicion. Such a machine could be a very useful tool in the hands of politicians intent on imposing their national identity on others as has been done to the Nagas for all these 62 years.
With that short personal opinion about the infamous AFSPA, let us now go to the historical background which brought AFSPA into existence in the 1950’ in the killing fields of Nagaland. In the first place AFSPA was not promulgated for the protection of the armed forces in the face of an invading enemy attack like the Chinese aggression of 1962. On the contrary, AFSPA was created to protect the Indian Army when they invaded Nagaland in the early 1950’s. It was created in the context of an invasion situation where all able bodied Nagas- both males as well as some females- were compelled to take up arms to defend their declared independence which had been declared on August 14, 1947.
At this stage of the war, the Nagas still did not have a uniformed army with conventional weapons which could differentiate them from the civilian population. As such, the Naga army, then, called The Naga Home Guards had the advantage of disappearing into civilian populations after encounters with the invading forces. On the other hand, the Indian army had the disadvantage of seeing every Naga face as that of one similar face which could not be differentiated from the others. Because of such difficulties in identifying Naga soldiers from the civilian population, the sanction to shoot to death even on mere suspicion was granted to the Indian army.
As for the Act, section 3 of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act of 1958 stipulates that for the AFSPA to become operative, an area has to be first declared as “a disturbed area” based on the sole opinion of the Governor of the state.
Now, the question that must be asked is: Was Nagaland really a disturbed area in the early 1950’s so much so that the Indian government had to promulgate the Assam Maintenance of Public Order Act 1953 followed by the Assam Disturbed Areas Act 1955 and eventually the AFSPA in 1958?
Now, as far as the historical facts and records show, the situation in Nagaland was still peaceful up to the end of March 1953. It was only after Nehru and U Nu’s visit on March 30, 1953 and the boycotting of the function by the Naga public because they were not allowed to present a memorandum to the two visiting Prime Ministers that trouble started. Right after they left, arrest warrants were issued against the NNC leaders. From that time on, one thing led to another until open hostilities broke out after the promulgation of the Assam Maintenance of Public Order Act in 1953. Subsequently, the Indian army moved into Nagaland in October 1955. To quote B.N. Mullick, the then Director of the Indian Intelligence Bureau, he had written: “Troops moved into Tuensang by October 1955 and the war with the Nagas started from then.”(B.N. Mullick: My years with Nehru, p.308) Note the word “troops moved into Tuensang.” It was not Naga troops moving into Assam or India, but Indian troops moving into Tuensang, Nagaland which caused the Indo Naga war and brought the AFSPA into existence. As for the number of troops deployed, Mullick admits that it was two Divisions of regular army and 35 battalions of Assam Rifles and paramilitary forces.(ibid p 312) In later stages of the war, far greater numbers of troops were deployed in Nagaland.
In this invasion issue, as far as the Nagas were concerned, ever since the declaration of their independence on 14th August, 1947, the Nagas had been defending their declared independence through non-violent means. Therefore, the Naga forces that rose up to defend its territories against this external aggression from India in October 1955 were not even a regular army, but as stated earlier-a rag tag defense force called The Home Guards with hardly any weapons.
To date, many Indian politicians have repeatedly tried to portray the Nagas as rebels and insurgents who are bent on seceding from India. However, the opposite is true in that Nagas peacefully hoisted their national flag on 14th August 1947, and have ever since been desperately holding on to the defense of that declared independence.
Now, both the Assam Disturbed Area Act of 1955, as well as the Armed Forces Special Powers Act of 1958 states that these Acts were promulgated for the maintenance of “public order” in a “disturbed” area. Therefore, the next question that must be asked is: WHO DISTURBED WHO?
Here again, as far as the factual historical records go, it is an undeniable historical fact that Nagas never went to Assam or India and disturbed Assamese or Indian peace in the 1950’s. It is however an indisputable fact that hundreds of thousands of Nagas died from Assam Armed police and Indian military atrocities in the 1950’s when 654 Naga villages were burnt to ashes by these invading forces. (Clearly recorded statistics are still available if anyone wishes to examine them.)
As for the justification reason stated in the AFSPA that the Act was necessitated for destroying “arms dumps” or “fortified positions” of Naga rebels, let the Indian government or its army furnish even one single picture of any one such destroyed ammunition dump or fortified position, used by the Naga army. These justification reasons are but imagined and exaggerated pictures created by the Indian government to justify the promulgation of the AFSPA. As a matter of fact, no such grave dangers from fortified positions or ammunition dumps have ever existed in the long drawn fifty nine year Indo- Naga conflict. On the contrary, in this conflict, Naga soldiers had to again and again undertake long tracks to Pakistan and China to refurbish exhausted ammunition as well as arms because they did not have ammunition dumps or fortified positions. The long drawn war has all along been one of a guerrilla war of running and fighting. As for fortified positions, the only fortified positions that the Naga army ever had were just temporary camps which were hastily abandoned when it came under heavy artillery as well as mortar attacks accompanied by thousands of ground troops.
Today many citizens of many other Indian states are also tasting and experiencing the many horrors that Naga s have experienced for the past five decades under AFSPA. It seems to me that what some Indian leaders had cleverly devised yesterday to deny the Nagas even their very right to life is today backfiring on Indian faces too.
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