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| K.V. Pusa |
Kohima, April 15 : The Congress has fervently appealed to the Naga voters to elect its candidate K. Asungba Sangtam to push forward the protracted Naga political problem and give momentum to the integration issue.
Addressing a rally last evening on the penultimate day of campaigning for the April 16 election, Nagaland PCC president, K.V. Pusa, said the Indian National Congress can take initiatives for finding a lasting and honourable solution to the Naga problem.
He said the Congress was committed to the “Naga integration”, which is a common aspiration of the people in the state. He said the party had been all along been supporting the issue and that there would be no backtracking on it.
Pusa said Nagaland became the 16th state under the Union of India by virtue of the 16-point agreement of 1960, whose clause 13 mentions about the integration of all contiguous Naga-inhabited areas. However, the Centre is yet to implement this clause, he said.
Pusa said the 12-year-old Naga peace talks between the Centre and the NSCN (Isak-Muivah) was too long and that a solution “acceptable and honourable” to both the parties must be worked out. He said the ceasefire vis-à-vis peace talks have taxed the Naga people to the maximum.
The PCC chief also urged the Centre to expedite the Naga talks in a transparent manner. CLP leader Chingawang Konyak said the Congress has been protecting the unique identity of the Naga people and, therefore, it is the only party which can resolve the issue.
Former chief minister and PCC election convenor K.L. Chishi also lashed out at the Nagaland People’s Front, the main constituent of the ruling Democratic Alliance of Nagaland (DAN), for its “high political rhetoric” just to woo the innocent Naga voters for political mileage. He said only the Congress could deliver justice to the people.
PCC vice president Nillo Rengma said the regional party spoke about the Naga political issue and their identity only during poll time, adding that after April 16, the Nagaland Peoples Front (NPF) would forget all about it.
Recalling that the then Congress Prime Minister Narasimha Rao had declared the Naga problem political, he questioned the inability of the Nagaland Peoples Front to resolve the Naga issue.
The Congress also branded chief minister Neiphiu Rio as “Varun of the East” because of his strong anti-Centre and anti-Constitutional statements throughout the election campaign.
“In order to gain electoral mileage he spoke more like a rebel leader than a chief minister of the state within the Union of India. Rio should spell out the harms the Congress had brought to the Nagas,” said R. Paphino, convenor of the PCC media cell.
He said Rio’s statements are contradictory because on the one hand he projects himself as a champion of the Christians and on the other he joins hands with the BJP, the communal “anti-Christian party” that is part of the DAN government.
On Rio’s defence of the NPF candidate for the LS seat, C.M. Chang, that marrying and living with three wives is accepted in Naga society, the Congress said the statement of the chief minister had displayed “his height of hypocrisy”. The statement is an insult to the Naga Christian community as Rio had directly challenged the authority of the Church that permits monogamy only, the party said.