UNTABA condemns ‘high handedness’ of Sivasagar dist. administration

Dimapur, July 26 (EMN): The United Naga Tribes Association Border Areas (UNTABA) strongly condemned the ‘high handedness of the authorities of Sivasagar district administration of Assam ‘for willfully trying to usurp and occupy the lands belonging to the Naga people in the border areas under Tuli ADC Hq, in Mokokchung district. A press release issued by the UNTABA President, Hukavi T Yeputhomi and General Secretary, Imsumongba Pongen, while condemning the alleged highhandedness of the Sivasagar district administration, asserted that this is not a ‘lone incident’. “The people and the authorities from Assam always try to provoke the peace loving Naga people living in the border areas stretching from Khelma side of Peren district to Tizit under Mon district by trying to establish or occupy the land under every lame excuse,” the UNTABA stated. In this connection, the release stated that unless the people under Mejensanger Putu Wameken (MPW) ‘handled the situation in a matured way as they did’, then another border clash would have erupted again thereby disturbing the peaceful atmosphere in the border areas. While reminding ‘again’ to the powers that be in Assam that there is no demarcated boundary between the two states ‘for which active litigation process is undergoing in the Supreme Court for the last 30 years’, the UNTABA asserted that if the people and authorities in Assam fails to accept this fact and stop such illegal intrusions, then it will not only invite the contempt of the court but will also invite more unwarranted tensions amongst the people living on both sides of the two states. In this connection, the UNTABA remained that “until the Civil Suit No. 2 of 1988 is brought to conclusion”, the authorities of both the states must work under the ‘Interim Agreement of 1972 and 1979 made between the two state government so as to maintain status quo’. Meanwhile, the UNTABA also asserted that it is ‘too little too less’, with regard to what it termed, the pre-emptive action initiated by the Nagaland government ahead of the publication of the controversial national Register of Citizens (NRC) Assam “since the entire stretch of the boundary between the two states, there is no demarcated boundary”. “Therefore, the people from both the states are living in an inter-mingled lifestyle in their day to day lives, hardly distinguishable from each other,” the release stated. Saying that it will be a herculean task to conduct verification in such a scenario, the UNTABA stated that it has been urging the state government of Nagaland time and again to take up the issue in the right perspective all this times”. It may be noted here that an there is an uneasy calm in the Assam-Nagaland border area in after the issue of a “land clearance” created tense situation in Amguri-Tuli sector under Mokokchung district. The tension, as per the reports started when a group of “Assamese people along with the security provided by Assam Police personnel and Administration of Sivasagar District” started clearing land for setting up of Police Outpost at a spot located at Watiyongpang Nagaland Gate on July 23. The situation is under control as per reports. Assam and Nagaland has a long standing land dispute and the issue is pending in the Supreme Court of India.