Mention the Indian Northeast and, for most, some searing images immediately come to mind. One of those, perhaps, is of a group of nude women protestors in front of the Assam Rifles headquarters in Manipur, challenging the soldiers to rape them; of gun-toting militants engaging in negotiations with the 'oppressive Indian government'; or of Irom Sharmila, a spare lady with curls, a resolute will and an ever-present nasal tube, through which she is force-fed as she continues her decade-long fast demanding the repeal of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act of 1958. Potent images all – but just how accurate, or all-encompassing, are they?
The Peripheral Centre, an anthology of 26 voices comprising academics, activists and writers, gives the reader a glimpse of a Northeast that is endowed with natural bounty but also ravaged by years of insurgency – a periphery that could never become part of the core architecture of the country. Many of the writings in this collection are by people who have experienced violent conflict in one form or another, some on an ongoing basis. Even against this emotional backdrop the essays are shorn of excess verbiage, communicating ideas that are clearly very deeply felt.
The anthology functions like a window, attempting to bridge the gap between mainland India and the Northeast. This includes explorations by both 'insiders' and 'outsiders', which constitutes a central split for many of the ongoing conflicts in the region. Here, the insiders try to look out of the window and explain the jagged faultlines around which they have been living; the outsiders look in and try to form their own understanding of a region that is not only ghettoised but has often been seen as a monolith. The Northeast is comprised of eight diverse states that are clubbed together as one homogeneous region; in turn, that area is often stereotyped as conflict-torn, unsafe and underdeveloped by the Indian 'mainstream', including by the media and policymakers. Yet such a view fails to understand that each of these states has its own distinctive culture, in its myriad facets, as well as its own problems.
While the book might not offer a roadmap for the future, it does provide important space to both insiders and outsiders to introspect and discuss their passion and vision for the states of the Northeast. The virtue of being an outsider is one that Preeti Gill, an editor with the Delhi-based publisher Zubaan, values without sentimentalisation. 'I do not intend this to be an apology for being an outsider,' she writes, 'but rather as a personal response to the region referred to as the Northeast, and to the many issues of national significance that each one of us outsiders must engage with because we are "Indian".'