The Zeliangrong Baudi, the apex body of the Zeliangrong tribes’ ardent desire to have the Rongmeis recognized as one of the in habitat indigenous tribe of Nagaland is genuinely understandable. Zeliangrong is, afterall, incomplete without the Rongmeis. In Nagaland, Zemai and Liangmai stand together as Zeliang, excluding Rongmei living in Manipur.
The question, however, is not about a particular Naga tribe unfairly demarcated outside of the present state boundary of Nagaland to some other state or country. The Nagas, for all these years and decades, have been fighting and is fighting for the integration of all the Naga inhabited areas in the North East of India and of those in Myanmar under one administrative umbrella. Needless to say, this integration never means mere population integration where we do not share a common border together.
The Zeliangrong Baudi, or, for that matter, the UNC in Manipur, will not be doing itself or the Rongmei people any favour by having a confrontational attitude with the Nagas in Nagaland. Instead, they have to understand the ground reality and capitalize on the very sympathetic sentiments that the Nagas of Nagaland naturally have towards our fellow Naga tribes living outside of the present State borders of Nagaland, where ever it may be. The Zeliangrong Baudi can take heart from the fact that there is even the house of the Angh of a Konyak village (the village adopted by our Hon’ble MP, Neiphiu Rio under the Sansad Aadarsh Gram Yojana) which has been bisected right down from the middle by the international boundary dividing India and Myanmar.
The Rongmei recognition issue is not a Zeliangrong specific problem, but a Naga problem. It is a Naga issue. It is not an issue which can be taken in isolation. Unfortunately, the Rongmei recognition issue has become the bone of contention in Nagaland today. It has the very real potential of inflicting irreversible damage to the very fabric of Naga unity, and thus, the larger Naga political issue. It has become the primary reason for the wide resentment among the various tribes of Nagaland, and thus, the formation of the NTC and the CNTC, with the CNTC making its stand very clear over its withdrawal from the Naga Hoho. As it is, the Naga Hoho has already been dealt with a body blow when the ENPO and the ENSF had exited from it and the NSF, as they felt shortchanged.
The present Nagaland, as a small state, has a population of some two million. Its socio-political and economic problems, however, are very complex. There are sixteen recognized tribes with some 50 to 60 different dialects. The State is economically underdeveloped with predominantly an agrarian economy, and a very difficult mountainous terrain. For a state of its size, it has a disproportionately large number of government employees numbering to 1,40,000 (one lac forty thousand) according to the latest data. This is a little over 7.1% of the State’s 19,80,602 population figure. The state spends 65% of its budget for the salaries alone.
To add to its woes, the State has an educated unemployed figure of nearly 80,000. This in itself presents a potentially explosive situation to say the least. The problem of unemployment for the state as a whole is quite endemic with the non-working population, which according to the Directorate of Economics & Statistics of the Govt. of Nagaland, is accounting for 50.77 of the total population. Also, taking advantage of Article 16(A) which empowers States to create quotas within quotas, the schedule tribes status of Nagaland has been further divided, rightly, into advanced tribes and backward tribes with different quotas. Even here, there are times where the social fabric in the society gets strained due to the unavoidable pressure in the scramble to avail the very limited jobs, seats and resources that is available in the state.
Taking all these into account, it will be good of our elders and leaders to also take into consideration the sentiments of the younger Naga people here in our state who all might be feeling that recognition of the Rongmeis as an inhabitant indigenous tribe of Nagaland, even though they have no ancestral land in Nagaland, will only open the floodgates for all the other 14 Naga tribes in Manipur, not to mention the Naga tribes living in Assam, Arunachal, and Myanmar, to legitimately demand the same. It has all the potential and ingredients to inflame passions of hatred and division within the big Naga family, and therefore, it can only be wise to de-recognize the Rongmei tribe as that of Nagaland’s without any further delay, till integration of our land is achieved.
