Z. Lohe
Just the other day, a Naga and his family members were physically attacked in Dimapur by non-Naga doubtful characters. As per paper reports, the victims did nothing wrong except rebuking the culprits for using the banned substance. Just because of having done the right thing, that was voicing against vice as consumption of detestable substance is indeed vice, the local Naga and family had to face harm. That was the tip of the iceberg. Our complacency and negligence will transform us into second class citizens in our land, and when so, such treatment will become the daily occurrence.
The major concern is how the miscreants had the courage to chase the victims and physically assaulted them. What may be the source of intrepidity of the culprits? What emboldened them to undermine the local Nagas, the proprietors of the State of Nagaland?
The Nagas of Nagaland are basically responsible for the immigrants to dominate the sons of the soil. The Nagas of Nagaland are the source of inspiration to these illegal citizens who feel free to do anything they like here in our land. The State administration is the protector and importer of illegal citizens in their several lakhs here in Nagaland. The Naga National Political Groups are the guardians of the aliens. The Student organisations and several NGOs are equally responsible for the menace of the massive presence of illegal people in Nagaland.
I joined with few writers who had shared their sincere concern on the danger of compromising all the protective laws which are at the disposal of State Govt. and yet allowed Nagaland to be co-owned by both legal and illegal owners alike. See what has already happened to our neighbour States. The tribal people are the legal and indigenous owners of Tripura State. Unfortunately, they are the secondary citizens in Tripura today as they are just 30% (as per my information) of the total population and they are under the dictation of 70% who rule over them. An indigenous tribal had to abandon his title and opted for Choudhury as his title. The reason being that lest he identifies himself to be Choudhury, he has no chance to get Govt. job or facilities. Recently, we have seen the agitation of the indigenous tribal Tripurians asking for creation of separate District for them from immigrant rulers. A prominent Khasi columnist told some of us that very high percentage of indigenous Khasis in Meghalaya are landless but just tenants of outsiders today. We all know what is the position and condition of the indigenous tribal people in Jharkhand today. They are the servants of those rich outside traders and industrialists in their land.
Nagaland has sufficient illegal citizens who are in the active process of transforming the indigenous Nagas into second class citizens in our land. This is neither exaggeration nor myth nor impossibility of such a situation sooner than thought otherwise in Nagaland because of the reason that those outsiders have both direct and indirect support of the locals. It is reportedly learnt that there are syndicates in hobnob with District administrations for mercantile business of issuing Indigenous certificate and ILP. People from UP and Bihar and the like do possess Indigenous certificates from Nagaland and those are recruited as locals from Nagaland into military services against Nagaland quota. Very recently, 3 MBBS seats were bagged by Nagas from Manipur who possessed Indigenous certificates though rectified after complaints lodged. Secondly, as highlighted already by few writers of late, several NNPGs recruited both legal non-Nagas and illegal immigrants to do their errands in complete contrary to the principle of the undivided National Movement. Thirdly, when the students’ organisations or youth organisations go for deportation drive, collection of money from those defaulters become the sole objective. In other words, if those illegal immigrants are deported from Nagaland, what will be the better resource is the mentality of Naga youngsters. In the light of these factors, Nagaland is the safest haven for lakhs of illegal immigrants.
By sheer grace of God, Nagaland State was created as special category State out of 16-Points Memorandum and equipped with requisite protective laws. Totally different from the rest of other States in the Union of India, Nagaland was born of political agreement with semi-Independence status. Whereas, in lieu of keeping the State in status quo or strengthening its status, we have been collectively tearing it down, and we are about to sell Nagaland to intruders for few bucks at this rate.
A week back I came across a story of how more than 800 illegal immigrants were disallowed to enter into Manipur from Myanmar at the international border. Arunachal Pradesh has been efficient and effective in the enforcement of ILP. Little less than 5 lakh Rohingya refugees are now in Bangladesh. There is no guarantee that these refugees will not come to Assam which is the most accessible destination. When these displaced people reach Assam, Nagaland is the ultimate destination as Assam adopts mechanism of pushing the unwanted section to disputed and sensitive Nagaland-Assam border so as to let its territory grow.
Passing the buck to one another will not help us to overcome the danger of volcanic eruption sooner or later. The political will and initiative has to come from State Govt. backed by all concern. If a single tribe with synchronized action plan can keep a District cleansed from the menace, what is not possible. NTC has urged Nagaland Govt. to enforce ILP uniformly without relaxation on any area. Who will come forward to support this? If not now, it’s getting late.
