Far eastern himalaya: The search for distance and dignity
The peoples of the Far Eastern Himalaya, isolated from each other by hills, jungles, rivers and national boundaries, confront similar challenges based on changing demography, economic neglect, conflict over resources and governmental suppression. In response, the Far Easterners are vehemently asserting their ethnic identity and fighting the paternalistic nation state. Cycles of unreason and circles of violence characterise a region that is fast becoming one of the most violent corners of Asia.
The stretch of the Far Eastern Himalaya from Sikkim eastward is significantly different from the rest of the mountain range. The reach of the Ganga plains—of Hindu ethos and historical Moslem influence—is much more muted here. If anything, many of the animistic hill tribes have gone the other way by embracing Christianity. Unlike the cultures of the faraway flatlands, these eastern communities are more directly linked to the Tibetans of the north, or the Indo-Chinese of the south and east.
The region is also unique in its geography. Although part of the same Himalayan range, these southern latitudes nurture a lush tropical landscape drenched by one of the highest precipitation rates in the world—strikingly different from the high desert of Ladakh or the dry terraces of West Nepal. The High Himalaya itself is lower at these extremities; with the peaks descending eastward from Mount Everest (8848m) in the Khumbu, to Kanchenjunga (8598m) at the Nepal-Sikkim border, to Namcha Barwa (7756m), standing guard as the great bend of the Tsangpo). .About here, the Himalaya breaks southward into Burma and dwindles away eastward into hills of the Hengduan mountains of Sichuan-Yunnan.
From Sikkim, with Tibet a constant companion to the North, the political boundary snakes across Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh, where it makes a sharp southern twist to plunge along the edges of Yunnan Province into Burma's Chin and Kachin hills, with spurs roping in the states of Meghalaya, Nagaland, Mizoram and Manipur, before meandering through Tripura into the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, close by the sea.
The western part of the Himalayan range is neatly packaged into a progression of states from Pakistan to Nepal to Bhutan. But here in the east the range becomes a geopolitical jigsaw, crossing national frontiers with impunity. The rectangle of the Far Eastern Himalaya is broken up among five nation states: little Bhutan, the Northeast of India, the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, the Arakan region of Northern Burma, the southeastern tip of Tibet and the hills of Yunnan.
Compared to the peopled Himalayan hills of Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Nepal and Sikkim, this is a region that is still under-populated with natural resources largely unexploited. Natural gas, petroleum, rushing water, minerals, tea, fish and timber—the wealth is there, largely un-exploited, due to reasons of history and geography. The bounty that was bypassed by the colonial rulers is eyed lustfully by today's market forces.
One potential source of wealth lies in the rivers that slice through the deep gorges and green valleys. Travelling eastward all the way from Mount Kailash, the great Tsangpo takes its 180 degree bend beneath Namcha Barwa, descending through vertical canyons into Arunachal Pradesh before disgorging into the Assam plain. Here are some of the most powerful rivers on earth, going by volume and gradient: the Brahmaputra (Tsangpo), Chin and Dibang. In the gorge country of Burma and Southeastern China are the headwaters of the Irrawady,Salween, Mekong and the Yangtze Kiang.
Asia in Miniature
While the geography and fractured frontiers of this region are fascinating in themselves, it is the population that holds even more interest: the cultural diversity and shared history, the deep animosities within and the xenophobia as far as outsiders are concerned. Ruled by the forest and inhabited by an endless procession of Tibeto-Burman tribes, the belt is a region of unceasing conflict, violence, anger and grief. Modern times seem only to have exacerbated the situation.
The babel of languages heard along this Himalayan flow includes the guttural Tibetan and its offspring Dzongkha, the sweeter Assamese in the Brahmaputra valley, and the lilt of Tibeto-Burman tongues in the hills of Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram. Each step of the way, the jungles seethe with unrest and rebellion, as diminutive men and women, some in battle fatigues and others in tattered clothing, some with modern weapons, others with crude arms, fight for ideals, funds, drug profits, or lost causes. They confront the military might of their respective governments.
This region is Asia in miniature, a place where the brown and yellow races meet. Taking a south-north transect, for example, you encounter the Bengali migrants in Assam, Tibeto-Burmans in the Himalayan midhills, and the Khampa of the high plateau. Going west to east, the spectrum is even more d iverse: from the people of Tibetan stock—the Bhutia and Lepcha of Sikkim and the Ngalong Dzongkha-speaking people next door in Bhutan—the population takes on Tibeto-Burman hues with the Sarchop of Eastern Bhutan, who have affinity with the tribes of neighbouring Arunachal. Eastward, the communities become progressively less 'Tibetan' and more 'Burman'. The variety is astounding.
The tiny state of Manipur, bordering on Burma, has a population of 1.8 million, yet it shelters more than 30 separate linguistic and ethnic groups, including the Tarao whose number is down to less than 400. The forested frontier between Yunnan and Burma is host to 15 distinct groups, including the Yi, Naxi, Bai and Lisn. Several communities of Arunachal Pradesh, such as the Abhor and the Mishing, are also to be found northward in Tibet.
Straddling the ages and the mountains, the people of this winding trail form an anthropological bridge to Southeast Asia, where the roots of many still lie. The Khasi of Meghalaya are believed to have come from Kampuchea and still speak a form of Mon-Khmer, although because of British missionary influence they use the English alphabet. The Thai Ahom migrated from Thailand to Assam 600 years ago and settled in a land they reported was as valuable as gold. The number of Thai speakers in Assam is small, but there is a Thai Association and the community is politically active.
There are Garos in Meghalaya and in Bangladesh; there are Nagas and Mizos in India and in the neighbouring hills of Burma. Festivals, liquor, dance, and music shape approaches to life and habitat of the tribes. History and contemporary experiences also forge attitudes, affinity and identity, the latter being regarded as the most crucial in maintaining both distance and dignity in the face of intrusion of the larger cultures of South Asia. Convictions about the sanctity of borders are weaker here than elsewhere. Many Nagas still refer to their own region as "Western Nagaland", referring to areas with Naga communities in Burma as "Eastern Nagaland". Guwahati, the capital of Assam, is closer to Hanoi than it is to Delhi. Watching graceful young women in sarongs, skirts and blouses pedal to work in Imphal, the capital of Manipur, one could easily imagine being in Vientiane or Rangoon. There is a fierce pride and independence that marks the tribes. And a disdain—despite using the good things that money can buy and Central funds can achieve—for the national elites and locals who they patronise.
This bewildering medley and mosaic is dear to the social scientist, but makes administration and political control extremely complex for the faraway capitals, be it New Delhi, Rangoon or Dhaka.
Shadow Play
What the constituent regions of the Far Eastern Himalaya also have in common is scarcity of information and difficulty of access. Southeastern Tibet, northern Burma, the Yunnan highlands, the Chittagong Hill Tracts, and Northeastern India—these are areas with negligible international profile. There is no other region this large in all of Asia of which as little is known. The fierce independence, deep enmities and seemingly eternal violence all occurs in a kind of a vacuum as far as the outside world is concerned. Relegated to the far corners of each of the nation states of which they form a part, the inhabitants live in a media shadow.
The recent outflow of the Rohingya and news about drug trade keeps northern Burma in the news pages, but on the whole this region is out of the information map. The same is true for the Chittagong Hill Tracts, whose sole claim to fame seems to be the outflow of Chakmas. Southern Bhutan is in the news only because that is where the Lhotshampa refugees emerge from. Compared to the detailed social science and other research that has gone on in, say, the Uttarakhand or Nepal hills, researchers have left the Far Eastern Himalaya largely alone. Even here, however, the south-eastern extremity of Tibet is unique for the absolute unavailability of information.
One of the reasons there is little reporting and research is because outsiders face restrictions in travel everywhere in the Far Eastern Himalaya. Nowhere do the national authorities of Burma, Bangladesh, India, Bhutan, and China allow free movement of outsiders, and in many cases there are restrictions even on citizens. Everywhere, diplomats, journalists scholars and independent travellers face special problems.
Thus have national governments successfully shielded the brutal military operations they have taken against the locals—often rebellious minorities seeking to preserve their identities—from outside eyes. By restricting access and travel, they have obscured this region from the ears and eyes of their own people as well.
It is by the choice of the locals that Indian citizens from the 'mainland' require special permits to enter the Northeast. However, this exclusivity is a double-edged sword, for it is due to this very lack of access that information about the uniqueness and aspirations of the Northeast is kept from the larger India.
Nevertheless, more news about the Northeast gets into the press than any of the other regions. In comparison to the news blackout as far as Southeast Tibet or Northern Burma are concerned, the Indian Northeast comes across as a very 'open' society indeed. Perhaps, as the rest of the region struggles to catch up, they too will be dogged by the problems that India's Northeast today faces. Perhaps, in that sense, the experience of the Northeast will be instructive for those elsewhere in the Far Eastern Himalaya, the rulers and the ruled alike.
Unity in Adversity
A shared ecology and geography, and a history of isolation, has given rise to lifestyles and languages that link the tribes and communities behind the five frontiers. In fact, many of these tribes have more in common with each other than with the nation states of which they form distant appendages.
The cultural chasm between the people of Northeastern India and those of the 'mainland' is so deep, and the leap through time that they have to take to catch up with the national cultural mainstream so great, that this region is unlikely to be psychologically integrated with India for some time to come. If the Sikkimese even today refer to the border point at Rongphu Bridge as the place where "India begins", the feeling of distance -is much more palpable in the hill states that lie to the east of Bhutan. Perhaps the map, too, aids in developing this mental state: every other part of India, including Kashmir, is joined integrally to the mainland, whereas the Northeast hangs on a 14 km neck of land between Nepal and Bangladesh.
The entire Far Eastern Himalaya is peopled by marginalised communities. These are peripheral groups, distant from the levers of governmental power. Much of their economic and political affairs are controlled and manipulated by all-powerful central entities. In most cases, tiny powerful local elites have emerged, patronised by the Centre, but these are invariably alienated from their own communities.
The failure to cope with change, an inability to deal with the major forces of economic and social transition that are transforming our world, is creating a deep sense of unease among this population.
A region that is used to oral traditions is being asked to turn to the newspaper and satellite television, one which used the traditional tribal methods of dispensing justice through village councils and chiefs is having to embrace British jurisprudence.
Vibrant communities are therefore turning inwards and nurturing deep resentment towards what they perceive to be colonial behaviour by central governments and national elites. This is true of the Northeasterner' s attitude towards the Hindu-dominated and Hindi-speaking belt of the Ganga plain, of the Chakma's towards Dhaka's rulers, and of the Tibetan's towards the Han cadre who call the shots from Lhasa.
Seen in reverse, loyalties of Nepali speakers being questioned in Thimphu, of the Chakma in Dhaka, of the Naga in Delhi, of the Rohingya in Rangoon. The domestic policies of the national governments to the marginal peoples are almost identical, varying perhaps only in the intensity of violence with which rebellions are crushed.
The problem profile of the region is also similar: a lack of industrial development, sluggish economic growth, a tattered infrastructure of roads, telecommunications and power, escalating demographic change, inadequate use of natural resources such as water, environmental degradation, low per capita income, and poor agricultural practices. Added to all this, of course, unrest and insurgency.
Because national authorities seem unable to recognise the cultural chasm, to meet basic needs, nor to devise a formula for sharing of the natural resources in which the region is so rich, there will be no peace in the Far Eastern Himalaya. While the people agitate for their identity, government is perfectly willing to exploit mineral reserves, allow forests to be razed for timber, and rivers to be dammed. A withering away of national boundaries is not in sight, but as long as the reality of separateness is not understood, the problems of the region will remain unaddressed and the inhabitants will continue to suffer under-development and violence.
Fractured World
Demographic change is the most immediate source of conflict in the Far Eastern Himalaya. Unwanted migrants are on the move across the region, in tens of thousands, trailing confrontations in their wake. Mass movement in a traditionally insular area invites linguistic, ethnic and religious strife. Settlement of an alien population leads to battle over resources, particularly land.
South Asia saw its largest migration during the Partition, and the Northeast was not spared. Though not on the same scale, exoduses and influxes continue, of both political refugees and economic migrants. National governments, which have their own political calculations to make, are not necessarily averse to population movements, for they can be used advantageously as vote banks, to open up frontier lands to economic exploitation, or as part of pacification and assimilation policies towards hostile local populations—as evident in the 'Han-isation' of Tibet by the China.
Indeed, the best orchestrated, and ongoing, migratory pattern is to be found north of the Himalayan divide, where people from mainland China are moving all the way into the Tibetan heartland of UTsang, and not just the outer provinces of Kham and Amdo. The Dalai Lama's aides maintain that the original population of six million Tibetans is being overwhelmed by the Han invasion. The official Chinese figures are far lower: they put the population within the Tibet Autonomous Region (excluding large sections who live in Kham and Amdo) at 2.12 million, and the number of Han Chinese at 79,000 (but excluding the tens of thousands of troops and Chinese cadres who live without permanent resident status).
Once the migrants or refugees arrive, the immediate cause of conflict is the question of land and its control. For host communities whose very cultures are derived from the soil and forests, the loss of land to migrant groups means a shedding of cultural identity. Population movements have affected every state in the Indian Northeast, and in two of them the original inhabitants have by now become minorities in their own land—which is the fear that impels all Northeasterners to react against migration.
One state whose indigenous inhabitants are now tiny minorities is Sikkim, where the Lepcha and Bhutia were overwhelmed over the course of the first half of the century by an inflow of Nepali-speakers. In was manipulation of the Nepali majority by New Delhi's political leadership which led to the kingdom's merger with the Indian Union in 1973.
The other state where the locals have become a minority is Tripura, the narrow thumb that juts into Bangladesh from the southeast of Assam. Once dominated by 19 Buddhist and Christian tribes, the state has been swamped by Hindu refugees from Bangladesh since the 1950s. In 1947, Tripura had a population of 600,000 of whom 93 percent were from the indigenous tribes. By 1981, the tribes had been reduced to a minority of 28.5 percent, out of a population of 2.06 million. Political power slipped out of the tribals' hands as they were displaced by the settlers. An insurgency began against the Bengali settlers in 1980 but it had ended by 1988.
Rejected Peoples
Numerous communities in this region constitute what political scientist Myron Weiner refers to as "rejected peoples". Count among them the Bangladeshi migrants in Assam, Chakma refugees in Arunachal and Tripura, the Rohingya refugees from Burma now taking shelter in Bangladesh, and the Lhotshampa refugees of Bhutan.
Bangladeshi. In few regions has the impact of population movement been as vivid, painful or divisive as in Assam. Its wide and fertile valley watered by the Brahmaputra, the state has long suffered from the depredations of migration, settlement and subsequent conflict. The place of origin for most of the migrants has been Bangladesh, which has a population density of more than 800 persons per sq km—the highest in the world. The corresponding density in the Northeast is 284 for Assam, 262 for Tripura and 33 for Mizoram. The "push" and "pull" factors are obvious.
Even unskilled labourers find a ready market as construction workers, porters and maids in the Northeast. Language is the key factor favouring Bangladeshi migrants, for Bengali is widely spoken in Assam and understood in the hinterland. The biggest outflow of Bangladeshis took place in 1970, when a brutal Pakistani army crackdown sent more than 10 million fleeing into India. Most went back, but more than a million stayed behind in West Bengal and Assam.
Influx into Assam continues today, largely due to economic and environmental conditions within a Bangladesh which seems to lurch through an unending cycle of flood, cyclone, drought and famine.
Reaction against immigrants has exploded several times in bloodshed and rioting. Movements against 'Bangladeshis' have shaken the Northeast since 1979, particularly in Assam, which has taken the brunt of the immigration. The conflict has been exacerbated by the fact that the migrants and their descendants are predominantly Muslim whereas the Assamese are largely Hindu. Today, the very word 'Bangladeshi' has taken on a pejorative meaning in Assam.
Attempts to get the refugees to return have only resulted in more tension and violence. Meanwhile, for decades, police and high officials—and especially politicians—have actively encouraged illegal migration because of the profits involved and the advantages of engaging in "vote bank politics".
The price, as always, is paid by innocent people, most brutally in 1983 when more than 4000 men, women and children, mostly Muslim settlers, were slaughtered in a series of pogroms in Assam during an election. The worst killings occurred in rice fields of the village of Nellie, where at least 1,700 were butchered.
Land was the source of conflict: the settlers had taken over—bought or bartered—property from locals even though such transactions were prohibited for non-tribals. However, there was poor implementation of land and tenancy laws, and there were politicians who depended on support from the Muslim vote bank. Over the years, resentment over dispossession built up in the Lalung tribe, until it finally exploded in 1983.
Although the violence against the Bangladeshi has ebbed, the settlers continue to be targets of distrust and political abuse. Lately, they have fallen victim to insurgency in the region, with frequent attacks on them by armed members of the Bodo Security Force in western Assam.
Chakma. Population movements are fed by remorseless factors. Take the case of the Chakma; they seek refuge in Tripura because they area religious minority, because their rights are being trampled upon, because their lands are being settled by Bengali-speakers in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, and because their loyalty is questioned by Dhaka. Even after decades, in some cases, the Chakma refugees have not been able to settle down in the host region, whether it is Arunachal Pradesh or Tripura.
Chittagong's hill tracts cover 5093 sq miles, or 16 percent of Bangladesh's surface area. Markfd by teak forests, swift streams, and undulating valleys, the area is bounded by Assam to the north, upper Burma to the east, the Arakan of Burma to the south, and Chittagong District to the west. There are 12 major tribes, largely Buddhist, who practice jhumming, or swidden agriculture.
When the Pakistan government completed the Kaptai hydro-electric project in 1964, the reservoir flooded about 40 percent of the arable land in the region and displaced more than 100,000 tribals. An estimated 20,000, mostly Chakmas but also some Mogs and Jajongs, moved across the frontier into Tripura. The refugees were first moved to the Lushai Hills, now Mizoram, and then offered a choice of three locations by the Indian authorities. They chose the North East Frontier Agency (NEFA), which is now Arunachal Pradesh.
While lightly populated Arunachal Pradesh—which was attacked and briefly annexed by China during the Indo-China war of 1962—has been one of the more quiet places of the Northeast, over the past year it too has become tense. The immediate reason is that the migrant Chakmas already make up seven percent of the population of 700,000. Student organisations have started a sustained campaign to oust the migrants, who have been threatened and intimidated, thousands fleeing to the relative safety of Assam.
Among the many contradictions that remain unresolved in the Northeast is the question of nationality. While the Indian Constitution states that any child born in India is a citizen, thousands of Chakma offspring who have been born in Arunachal since the 1960s have not been absorbed by India. On the other hand, if the children are to be accepted, where are the parents to go? The state which they fled does not exist, and the successor state of Bangladesh does not recognise them as nationals.
The largerand more recent influx of Chakmas has less to do with the Kaptai Dam and more with population movements within Bangladesh. The root cause lies in Dhaka's programme to settle the Chittagong hills with Muslim Bengalis from the over-populated delta region. This concerted move to 'Bengalise' the region drew sharp reaction, culminating in an armed revolt in the 1970s by an armed group calling itself the Shanti Bahini. There have been several bouts of conflict in the past 20 years between the Bangladeshi armed forces and the tribal nationalists, who have received armed and training support from New Delhi's security agencies.
The Dhaka government's crackdown was been brutal. It devastated culture, kinship ties and tradition, which resulted in refugee surges across into Tripura in 1978, again in the early 1980s, and most recently in 1989. While New Delhi and Dhaka have been engaged in talks and there has been some repatriation, about 50,000 refugees remain in camps on the Indian side, unwilling to believe Dhaka's assurances of security. It is not even clear that the two countries are genuinely interested in solving the problem; for Indian security agencies, particularly the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the Shanti Bahini remains a pawn in the power game.
Rohingya. Bangladesh plays host to its own 'Chakma situation' in the case of the Rohingya. Over a period of a quarter century, first in 1978 and then in 1992, the Burmese military has swept into the Muslim dominated Arakan Province in drives against Rohingyas. These Arakanese are regarded as not sufficiently Burmese as more Islamic than nationalist. The Burmese authorities, who are predominantly Buddhist, have claimed that many of those in the Arakan area are not really Burmese and that they have illegally crossed over from Bangladesh.
The Rohingyas' low-level rebellion has existed for decades but not much information is available, other than that the government crackdowns were vicious. The military regime in Rangoon has always been wary of the Muslim population for having independent leanings. Its actions have led to two waves of refugees into Bangladesh, totalling more than 200,000 Rohingyas each time. Not surprisingly, Rangoon claims that those driven out are Bangladeshi, a charge the Rohingya strongly deny. Efforts to repatriate them have not succeeded, although lately Burma has agreed to international monitoring of a future repatriation process.
For all their genuine grievances, the Rohingya too have been enmeshed in regional geopolitics. The troubles with the military and the Rohingya is seen by many as part of the larger confrontation between Burma and Bangladesh, which views with unease Beijing's military assistance to Rangoon. There are credible accounts of Rohingyas..receiving military training from Bangladeshi intelligence and military agencies.
Lhotshampa. The story of Nepali settlement in Bhutan is less than a hundred years old. Encouraged by the. Bhutanese Governor of Western Bhutan, in the late 19th century Nepalis from the over-populated hills of the home country moved in as labourers and farmers. Over the decades, they prospered and their numbers grew in settlements and jungle clearings along the Dragon Kingdom's southern border. These frontiersmen and women who helped create today's rich farmlands and orchards came to be known as the Lhotshampa, the people of the south.
When a census in 1988 turned up many more Nepali-speakers than the authorities had expected, Thimphu's fears of the being overwhelmed by a Nepali swamping and going the way of the Chogyals' Sikkim were heightened. In an interview in 1993, King Jigme Singye Wangchuk, Bhutan's absolute monarch, said that as many as 113,000 had been identified as illegal migrants in a newly calculated national population of 600,000. The anti-royalist agitation in Nepal which reduced the once-absolute monarch King Birendra to a titular head of state, also clearly worried Thimphu.
Like elsewhere in the Northeast, the fear of losing their 'Drukpa' identity led the Bhutanese authorities to engage in a fierce anti-migrant reaction. Unlike the other communities of the Northeast, who are battling the establishment, however, here it was the Government itself, representing the dominant community, that oversaw the process with the resources at its command.
As the pressures grew in southern Bhutan, the first refugees fled into the Jalpaiguri tea belt of India, and from there transited to eastern Nepal's Jhapa District. The first surge of exiles, of about 35,000, might be called true "political refugees": terrorized, famished, and very sick. Those who came later constitute a amorphous category, for it seems that they departed not because of political repression but because life was becoming too difficult to manage in isolated farms and hilltop hamlets.
There are today more than 110,000 Lhotshampa refugees, both in the camps of Jhapa and scattered across Nepal and neighbouring areas of India. Kathmandu has been roundly outmaneuvered by Thimphu in bilateral talks that have gone on for three years. The Bhutanese government has managed to rid the country of a seventh of its population, and controlling the remaining Lhotshampa will be that much easier.
The process is the same everywhere: mass movement into a lightly populated region from regions of high density. The cycle consists of displacement, migration, settlement, identity loss, resentment, leading to violence on the settlers and counter-violence by settlers. It is not true, however, that conflicts have always been between hill tribals and invading plains folks from outside the region. The fratricidal confrontation between the Kuki and Naga tribes is a case in point. Over the course of the past three years, more than a thousand Kukis and Nagas are known to have been killed in increasingly violent attacks and counter-attacks on each other. The bitterness between the two sides, too, is linked to migration. Kukis settled traditional Naga lands several decades ago, and the memories linger.
Strategic Compulsions
It is strategic compulsions that drive rulers of nation states to seek control over distant communities and to snuff out the insurgencies and agitations which resist such control. No one has much time for critical questions relating to human rights, the sweeping powers given to the security forces, and inherent disharmony between communities of the periphery and the central governments.
Why donation states attach such importance to these peripheral areas? In one phrase, it is fear of disintegration of the nation state, which can never be allowed, for no national leader wants to be accused of having dismembered the motherland. Another reason is the vast natural bounty of these places: the oil, gas and other minerals, the timber, hydropower, fertile soil, and the biodiversity.
Men in uniform and those from security agencies swarm over the region. India, for one, justifies their presence not merely because of the insurgencies it faces but the presence of tens of thousands of well-equipped Chinese troops on the other side of the mountainous border. The strategic importance given to the Northeast can be seen in the fact that large state of Arunachal Pradesh does not have a single civilian airport. Meanwhile, the military helps in the expensive task of airdropping food and consumer goods to scattered civilian communities.
It is not just Central neglect and lack of vision that is holding the Far Eastern Himalaya back. The extensive and deep-rooted insurgencies also have a role. In all cases, the earlier convictions and total commitment to independence from the nation state no longer hold good. Often, the violence-for-violence's-sake ethos among the insurgents coupled with the rigid stance of government keeps moderates from finding a voice. Many insurgents stay on to fight in the jungle simply because they know of no other way. Also, new equations have developed in these wooded hills of the Far Eastern Himalaya. Drug smuggling has become one of the major sources of funding for the guerillas in the woods, which fuels insurgencies and maintains the circle of violence. Meanwhile, much of the halo of the insurgents has dimmed. Many are feared, even among their own people, as ruthless figures who will kill if the price is right.
The most enduring conflicts are in India's Nagaland and Manipur, and in Burma between Rangoon's generals and the Kachin and Karen, whose rebellions have lasted half a century. In the Northeast, the Naga and Bodo of Assam present the biggest challenges to the state security apparatus. The National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) and the Bodo Security Force have established common training camps and often work together to ambush security forces.
The trend for the future is clear: an increasingly sharp delineation between areas of governance by the state and ungovernable areas where the political vacuum is filled by powerful dissident groups like the NSCN and the Bodo Security Force. The Indian state has failed to ensure stability in parts of Manipur and Nagaland, and to a lesser degree along the northwestern edge of Assam where it touches Bhutan. As a result, the NSCN controls parts of Manipur, especially the Ukhrul and Senapati districts; it levies taxes, recruits people (often forcibly) into its army, and harasses businessmen.
Likewise, the Bodo Security Force has the run of parts of Kokrajhar District of Assam, and uses the forests of southern Bhutan as a hideout. The Bhutanese are disinclined to act against the Bodes because they are outgunned, and several operations mounted by the Indian Army with King Jigme's permission have failed to flush them out. In recent months, the NSCN seems to haveexpanded its base and made inroads into the Naga-dominated district of North Cachar hills, ambushing troops and engaging in major gun battles. It has access to funds through the fear it inspires among the tea planters, who pay protection money much as they did to the ULFA when it held sway between 1988 and 1992.
Mother of Insurgencies
Every state in the Indian Northeast, barring Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya, has seen major armed insurrections against the Indian state. The response of the state has been, as usual, to call in the army and invoke sweeping powers of search and detention. Once, it even flung the Air Force against Mizo rebels.
The entire region is heavily militarised, from Tibet through the Indian Northeast and into Bangladesh and Northern Burma. Firstly, there is the military presence to guard the borders, particularly along the lode-Tibetan frontier. And then there is the heavy military presence to maintain order over a sullen populace, as in the case of the People's Liberation Army in Tibet, or to pacify rebel groups, as with SLORC's forces in northern Burma and the Indian Army's extensive presence in the Northeast.
The role of the unfriendly neighbour, which Indians euphemistically call "the foreign hand", is also significant in sustaining militant organisations. The Shanti Bahini operates in the Chittagong hills with help from Indian agencies, and the rebels in northern Burma are said to receive support from Dhaka. As far as the Northeast is concerned, in the 1960s, it was Pakistan and China that were providing sustenance to the Naga and Mizo rebels. This support ended with the 1971 Indo-Pak war. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Kachin Independent Army was providing support, training and weapons to the NSCN, the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), and to various Manipuri groups. This backing faded after New Delhi threatened to oust Burmese refugees who had fled the repressive SLORC regime and were staying in India. Subsequently, the NSCN, basing itself along the Bangladeshi and Burmese borders, has used its own skills to forge a leadership of the Northeastern rebellions. As far as the Northeast is concerned, says one intelligence specialist, the NSCN is "the mother of all insurgencies".
Another pattern that seems to characterise the regional rebellions is the breakdown of "accords", when agreements between rebel forces and governments go sour. The only successful agreement between militants and the Indian state seems to have been the Mizoram Accord of 1987, which enabled insurgents to surrender, receive an amnesty, and start life afresh.
Most of the other agreements have been fatally flawed, beginning with the Shillong Accord of 1975 between one group of Naga rebels and the Indian Government, which fell apart and led to the growth of the NSCN. The pattern of breakdown of accords tend s to be similar: acceptance of accommodation by moderates and subsequent rejection by hardliners. This has happened in Tripura and in Assam, especially with regard to the Bodo. The hard core of the ULFA leadership also rejected peace moves by their colleagues, and the organisation suffered a split from which it has yet to recover. When the Bodo struck a deal for greater autonomy with the Government of Assam in 1993, the package of promises began to unravel because the Bodo homeland's borders had been left undefined, as had been the all-important question of power-sharing. The extreme Bodo Security Force, which seeks full independence from India, struck at security forces and vulnerable targets such as unarmed Bengali settlers, in order to demonstrate its power and its rejection of the accord.
In Burma, the Rangoon government has followed a policy of punitive action against rebel groups combined with efforts to buy them out. This has worked with some groups, including a prominent Communist faction, and failed with others. One of the key factors about insurgencies and governmental response in Burma is that both have their fingers in the drug trade. Over the decades, Burma has emerged as the single largest exporter of heroin to the West, and both government officials and insurgents depend on the trade for funds.
Into the Next Millennium
Amidst the crises overwhelming these fractured lands, it is difficult to envisage what the future holds for the Naga and the Mizo, the Ahom and the Mishing, the Khampa and the Chakma. Migration will continue, for no walls, laws or police forces can stop people, like water, from seeking their own levels for survival. In a Subcontinent which will see nearly a billion Indians, 220 million Bangladeshis and 30 million Nepalis (in Nepal) by the year 2020, it is not feasible to hope that population flows will cease entirely.
Likewise, the nationalistic grip on the region by each of country capitals will continue, constricting the space for autonomy and self-determination. The market forces, the state and the local elites are bound to continue to be in league to exploit the natural resources in a manner that only a few will benefit, and not necessarily the tribals with closest links to the land. The rebellions that have become the defining attribute of the region are also likely to continue, although individual insurgencies may tire out and disappear.
At the same time, it is doubtful that greater autonomy to economically unviable, small communities will benefit the people in the long run, except in temporarily raising hopes and creating new local aristocracies. Without outside personnel and central funds, these states and provinces will find it difficult to fulfil modern desires that have grown over the decades. Some of these might still be forest societies, but everyone wants to modernise.
The choice for the Far Eastern Himalaya is dear. It is either to throw up one's hands in despair at the problems associated with divided geography, migration, reaction and military presence. Or it is to try to chart a path that involves joint planning for economic growth. If massive inflows of migrants and refugees are to be reduced, and the people of the region are to be saved from endless rebellions, the economies of the Far Eastern Himalaya, relegated to the periphery for too long, must expand, and expand on all sides.
Economic development, rooted in the sharing of water and other natural resources, multilateral trade, and assisting communities at the micro level—instead of imposing centrally sponsored schemes—seems to be the way out. A sense of inclusion and participation of local communities is critical in making programmes work. Paternalism only provokes bitterness. Locals need to be given effective control over resources, and development schemes must have their participation and not be devised and dictated by central authorities. An example of effective local institution-building is the system of Block Development Villages in Nagaland, where locally managed schemes are working where larger top-down schemes have not.
In Delhi in early May, South Asia's leaders decided to move ahead with the South Asia Preferential Trade Zone (SAPTA). In fact, the region of the Far Eastern Himalaya, so different from the rest of South Asia and so much like each other across the borders, would seem to make a coherent trading block in its own right. The absurdity of national boundaries that divide similar peoples and breaks up viable economic units is nowhere more clear than it is here, which is why this eastern Himalayan stretch could constitute a suitable area to make regional cooperation begin to work.
A formula has to be found where it is possible to work across the borders while maintaining the sanctity of frontiers, The possibilities are endless, if the vision exists. True, it will require the national governments which have barely begun to address some of these issues to put their heads together, and for moderates among the regional leadership to make a show of their strength. In the end, only regionalism spurred by the search for economic possibilities will bring peace and progress to the Far Eastern Himalaya.
A network of small and medium dam projects in parts of Bhutan, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh would tap the explosive power of the rivers and streams disgorging from the Himalaya. The production of hydro energy would spur economic growth in both hill and plain. The reduction of flood damage would open up new lands for cultivation and ease some of the demographic pressures in the Bengali-speaking lowlands. Power could also be exported to other parts of India and Southeast Asia, for energy hunger is destined to grow rapidly in the next decades as unshackled economies surge forward.
One may be forgiven for looking ahead to the day when workers from different parts of the region participate in economic activity under strict migration and employment laws. The economies cannot expand without better roads, railways and communication facilities, and these arteries should be intra-regional and not merely for maintaining links with the individual national mainlands. Opening up of port and transit facilities in Bangladesh and Burma would itself, in one stroke, provide economic fillip to the hinterland.
With a loosening up of border restrictions, numerous cross border contacts would be resumed. To use just one example, the Garo and the Khasi of Meghalaya would restart their trade routes with Bangladesh, facilities that they enjoyed for centuries before Sir Cyril Radcliffe drew the line that divided British India. Rather than transport their goods to Assam using unreliable public transport, they would, like in the past, simply march "down the hill" into Bangladesh.
Development of tourism and promotion of handicraft and handloom industries will also make an impact. In India, the marketing of products should involve much more than displaying local items at the state emporiums in New Delhi, and must involve a look at national and international possibilities. Improved agriculture and water-use strategies will strengthen community-based economies, and there should be a major emphasis in adding value to exported items, so that it is not only raw products such as timber, and crude petroleum that exit the region.
This is not to say that insurgencies will end. Ethnic aspirations and questions of identity will remain. But at a time when the world has recognised that mere political independence does not necessarily lead to a better future, ultimate peace to the Far Eastern Himalaya will come when a measure of autonomy is accompanied by access to markets, and the definite possibilities of improving the economic conditions of one's life.
A period of education is required, both for the regional leadership as well a s the national elites, in the search for peace and prosperity in the Far Eastern Himalaya. The people have spanned more than a thousand years in a lifetime, and they, more than anyone else, would like to see the creation of a new and revitalised region.
Concern for the Northeast
A series of reports in recent weeks in the Indian press indicates that concern for the Northeast situation is at a heightened level among Indian policy-makers.
The Chief of Army Staff General Shankar Roychowdhury said on 8 February in Guwahati that a "Northeastern coordination council of security forces" should be formed immediately to tackle the insurgency problem. He said the Inter Services Intelligence USD of Pakistan was providing support to the rebels, but refused to elaborate. The situation in both Kashmir and the Northeast was assuming the dimensions of an external aggression, and it would be short-sighted to treat it merely as a law and order situation. With the NSCN (Muivah group) extending its activities to Nagaland and parts of Assam, it was necessary to look at the entire Northeastern region as one unit as far as security was concerned. Earlier, General Roychowdhury had stated that the insurgency problem in the Northeast was as sensitive as the terrorist activity in Kashmir, with external forces playing an equally disruptive role.
On 29 April, the Union Home Secretary K. Padmanabhaiah stated in Shillong that "self-imposed isolation" of the people of the Northeast punctuated with "some extent of negligence of the Centre" was the main cause of the prevailing uncertainty. An "action-oriented coordinated and concentrated" plan was required to solve the burning problems in the region: there was a need to boost the morale of the police force by providing them with basic facilities, and the Northeastern Police Academy should provide proper training. Other than in Nagaland, the insurgent groups of the region had no ideology and represented nothing but "lawlessness". The media, meanwhile, should highlight genuine problems of the region without projecting only the negative aspects. While there were some genuine grievances of the people of the region, it did not mean that one should "retreat from the spirit of oneness with India".
A study prepared by the 1993 batch of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officials titled Understanding Ethnic Unrest in Indian Peripheries-1994, which was released on 2 May, asserts that political parties are responsible for fuelling ethnic unrest in the Northeast. The paper also points the finger at the absence of development, exploitation by outsiders, and absence of policy decisions. Among other things, the paper states: "The central leadership of mainstream political parties has manipulated ethnic symbols… The frequent imposition of President's rule has also reinforced the imperialist image of the Centre… The political bosses have failed to establish psycho-emotional links with the historically insulated population… The influx of 'outsiders' has altered the demographic pattern and reduced the local population to a minority… External material and moral support has sustained ethnic movements in border areas..," To contain external interference, the study suggests that India improve its bilateral relations with its neighbours. The IAS officials suggest "a single-minded devotion to economic development" in the Northeast, stating that "the population should derive meaningful benefits from economic activities rather than being exploited by them… Ethnic violence is the manifestation of a deeper malaise in the system and can hardly be contained by military or political action."
On 5 May in Guwahati, the Union Finance Minister Manmohan Singh stressed the need for "serious analysis of the underlying causes of unrest and insurgency in the Northeast so that the development process could be accelerated in the proper direction. It would be a tragic mistake to regard the problem created by secessionist forces as merely a law and order situation, he warned, and said "the design and style of a social, economic and political evolution of a good society must fully take into account the multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-religious characteristics of the societies, of the region…" Subsequent to identifying the root causes of discontent in the Northeast, "we can and we must evolve imaginative approaches to deal with them," said the Finance Minister, who represents Assam in the Rajya Sabha. In view of the pluralism and diversity of the societies of the Northeast, special arrangements had to be made in the form of autonomous district councils with powers to protect the interests of tribal communities, their social customs and customary laws. The quality of public administration must be toned up, and civil servants should have an incentive to serve in the Northeast rather than treating the region as a "punishment posting". The proposed Northeast Development Bank should be able to provide the regional economy with a much-needed boost, he said.
The Finance Minister was giving the keynote address at a regional conference organised by the Indira Gandhi Memorial Trust. Sonia Gandhi, Chairperson of the Trust, told the gathering that both Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi had deep interest in the people of the Northeast and their "aspirations, concerns, problems and hopes…"