Dr. Dietho-o
Nagas’ struggle for Peoplehood & Nationhood
Ever since human civilization began on earth, many people groups or cultures must have come and gone, many mighty nations or kingdoms must have appeared and disappeared; tremendous upheavals or altercations must have taken place, shifting and displacing things or lands and peoples. No one can fully imagine the magnitude of change that must have taken place. Many famous peoples and nations whose names and stories filled up the pages of ancient history or biblical accounts are not even heard of or talked about any longer. They are just no more, as though they have been erased or wiped out from the face of the earth. Where have they gone?
“You’ll stare at his once famous place and- nothing.”
“Though you look for them, they will not be found.”
– Psalm 37:10
In the midst of all these and over the long haul of history, a small group of people called the Naga Tribes somehow managed to survive on, inhabiting this pristine part of the world as their ancestral homeland, maintaining their identity and practising their own tradition and culture, and even searching for a proper place in the modern world. How come? No one has all the answers. Providence or grace, it is beyond explanation. If size and number be all that count or matter, we stand nowhere. But if aspiration and resolve matter, based on proper and solid historical right, we are second to none. Our vintage history makes us a small people with big ideas (dreams and determination) in our heads.
Our journey is an uphill task, but we are already involved in it. It has become our affair. Probably nothing has moved the Naga thinking like the concept and dream of freedom or independence. No Naga soul is spared; in fact it is flowing in the blood. Today we live as if it is our birthright and even with a foretaste of it in our thought world. Whenever and wherever people gather, expressions like, “We shall overcome”, “Together we can”, easily flow out of our mouths.
Ours is a Peoples’ Movement initiated by our ancestors and pioneer national leaders for the entire Naga people and the entire Naga homeland, not more, not less. Nobody can afford to make it some people’s movement or a few people’s movement. It is a common struggle towards a common destiny and the rest is history. There is no dearth of records and documents.
What really matters today is the quality of our response to the situations and challenges. What ultimately counts is the type of people we have become and the kind of societies we are creating today. If our struggle has tempered us well, making us better people, then we are becoming a prepared people. If not, we need to humble ourselves to learn and grow. Here lies our chance.
“The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.”
– Albert Einstein
We need to stretch our minds and come out of the charlatan’s world. We should not trust or thrust our own ideas to the exclusion of every other one. We should not trust or thrust other people’s ideas to the exclusion of our own. Nor should we run out of ideas. Never, we cannot and we will not. Fortunately and advantageously, Christianity is predominant in our land and we are exposed to the best minds and worldviews that ever existed. As we move on, we must hammer out the most that could be and the best that is yet to be. God help us.
