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| Isak Chishi Swu and Thuingaleng Muivah |
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New Delhi, Nov 19 : The Centre hopes to
reach a solution to the Naga problem in less than two years, largely
putting the onus of accepting the proposal on the National Socialist
Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah).
The government has not defined a
timeframe, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi does not want the issue to
be dragged any more, sources said.
The NSCN (I-M) signed a ceasefire with the
Centre in 1997 and since then, over 70 rounds of talks have been
conducted in India and abroad.
With a new government in place, NSCN (I-M)
leaders Isak Chishi Swu and Thuingaleng Muivah have been camping in the
capital for months to meet the Prime Minister.
Handing over the responsibility of
devising a proposed settlement to the interlocutor for talks, R.N. Ravi,
the Centre wants a proposal roughly within a year or one-and-a-half
years.
For the peace talks riding on a ceasefire
agreement signed in 1997 and continuing without an end in sight, the
Modi government’s decision to have a timeframe is significant.
A senior official involved in the talks
said, “Two years is too long a period,” when asked if a settlement could
be proposed within the next two years. Ravi is expected to start the
negotiation “afresh”, not necessarily on the lines of what was proposed
by previous interlocutors.
Ever since the ceasefire agreement from
August 1, 1997, after a preparatory meeting of then Prime Minister H.D.
Deve Gowda with NSCN (I-M) leaders in Zurich in February that year,
negotiations have gone through ups and downs. Since then, Swaraj
Kaushal, K. Padmanabhaiah, R.S. Pandey, Ajit Lal and Ravi have served as
interlocutors.
A proposed solution for the rebels, however, may be different from what the NSCN (I-M) expects.
Although officials denied spelling out a
roadmap, they conceded that negotiations have dragged for long enough to
test the patience of all parties, including the Naga people.
For the hawks in the establishment, a
solution beyond statehood granted to Nagaland in 1963 looked distant but
for others, an out-of-the-box solution to demands of autonomy to
Naga-inhabited territories in other states could be explored. Modi is
likely to discuss the issue on November 30 with chief ministers of the
two major stakeholder states — Nagaland and Manipur.
The Prime Minister is meeting the
northeastern chief ministers in Guwahati soon to discuss issues
pertaining to internal security.
Over the years, the NSCN (I-M)’s major
demands of “sovereignty and integration of Naga areas” appeared to have
undergone a conceptual change but without any change in the political
rhetoric.
In fact, both Nagaland and Manipur have
used the issue during state elections, resulting in a widening rift
between communities, chiefly the Meiteis and the Nagas.
As the NSCN (I-M) talks with the Centre,
two other NSCN factions — one led by Myanmar-based S.S. Khaplang and
another led by Khole Konyak and Kitovi Zhimomi — wait in the wings for
their turn to negotiate.
The NSCN (I-M), however, remains the formidable rebel outfit, concede officials.
Citing “promises” by previous governments
of talks at the “political level”, the rebel leaders expect Modi to
grant them an audience.
Although all Prime Ministers since the
1997 ceasefire agreement have met Swu and Muivah, Modi has departed from
the norm. Even home minister Rajnath Singh may not intervene before a
semblance of a settlement has been hammered out by Ravi. The former
intelligence bureau special director, who is also the joint intelligence
committee chairman, is seen as a tough negotiator with a firm
grounding of regional issues.
National security adviser Ajit Doval also
carries a similar image of being a tough negotiator, an imprint of which
may be found in the Modi government’s policy on dealing with militant
groups.
Sensing the toughened stance of the Centre
and under pressure for a resolution by its young leaders, the NSCN
(I-M) has begun to prepare for “any eventuality”.
Earlier this year, the NSCN (I-M)
despatched a few of its middle-rung leaders to Myanmar to deliberate on
options with other “friendly” rebel groups. “Any group which sees a
distinct possibility of either a success or a failure would prepare for
it, and we understand that,” a top official told The Telegraph, betraying the government’s uncompromising stand irrespective of the rebel group’s “preparations”.
Union home secretary Anil Goswami who is
in Yangon this week for a home secretary-level dialogue with the Myanmar
authorities is likely to raise this issue, alongside flagging the
presence of other rebel groups from Northeast in Myanmar. The dialogue
was last month deferred by the Indian side because of Cyclone Hudhud
that hit India’s eastern coast.