Will the Nagas experience a new dawn?
On his customary pre-Independence Day message, Nagaland Governor RN Ravi said the State is at the cusp “of history with a new dawn of peace and prosperity beckoning Nagaland” and the Nagas should not miss the “historic opportunity.”
Later, addressing the civic reception organised in his honour on August 16, the Interlocutor to Naga Peace Talk said that the shadow cast by the unresolved Naga political issue “must go” and the Naga people “deserve sunshine now.”
He opined that there was a sincere intention in every attempt of the talk but lamented that inclusivity was missing. “By inclusive, I mean all of the Naga armed groups, Naga tribal bodies, civil societies, grass-root leaders, intellectuals, senior citizens, elders and of course the Naga legislators because Naga political issue belongs to the Naga people. No organization has exclusive franchise over it,” he expounded.
Further noting that the Prime Minister expressed the need to conclude the peace process within a three month time during his (Ravi’s) appointment, he said: "That is a long enough time because we have been talking and negotiating for the last 22 years. In the last five years we have taken spontaneous steps by including all the stakeholders; both sides trying their best, and there is no reason why we cannot conclude it."
Ravi’s underlining of ‘sunshine,’ right after the customary waving of ‘Rainbow’ across Naga inhabited areas on August 14, if juxtaposed, carries huge significance.
By all indications, during the celebrations of the NPG’s Naga Independence Day on August 14, overtures for rapprochement were perceptible from different angles.
Yaruiwo (President), NSCN/GPRN, Q Tuccu noted that “Reconciliation is divine” and “every section of Naga brothers and sisters in different camps” should come aboard for the “final solution.” “Every issue with the neighbours must be resolved through respecting each other’s history,” he added.
The GPRN/NSCN Ato Kilonser and convener of Working Committee Naga National Political Groups (NNPGs), N Kitovi Zhimomi at Camp Kehoi , likewise, stated that time has come to prepare “ourselves and embrace a political settlement where all Nagas can participate and redefine our destiny afresh as a people.” The solution at hand is not just for Nagas of Nagaland state alone- but is inclusive of “Naga-lands, Naga sons and daughters of the present states of Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh,” he indicated.
Such overtures from all sides give a much-needed impetus and assurances to uncertainty prevailing over the ongoing talks; the apprehensions heightened after the paradigmatic development in Jammu and Kashmir, in the first week of August.
Symbolically, rainbow usually follows the rain, offering new hope. Biblically, it signifies God’s Covenant with Human, and bears the symbol of peace on earth.’ It also used as signs of equality and diversity for LGBTQ social movement.
Sunshine usually follows a dark night or gloomy period. Intermittently, both can be used in to signify similar context. It is also logical a rainbow, is usually accompanied by ‘Sunshine’ heralding the departure from something unpleasant.
Unfortunately, shaped by various historical and contemporary circumstances, both internal and external, Naga society, at this crucial juncture, is a hugely divided house, socially and politically; the chasm too big to ignore with the ominous prospect of retrograding from inclusion to division on the horizon. The desire for ‘rainbow,’ literally and metaphorically, thus, seems improbable.
Reconciliation is the need of the hour and the Naga society as a whole should strive for the collective good rather than individual triumph, to spot and experience the rainbow and sunshine, after a very tumultuous past.
