"The Naga Peace Process : Moving towards a settlement or further crisis" a talk by Prof. Sajal Nag at Teen Murti House, Teen Murti Marg > 3pm on 18th October 2013

Time : 3:00 pm 

Entry : Free (Seating on First-Come First-Served basis)

Place : Seminar Room, 1st Floor, Nehru Memorial Museum & Library (NMML), Teen Murti House, Teen Murti Marg, New Delhi
Venue Info :  Events | About | Map | Nearest Metro Station - 'Race Course(Yellow Line)'

Event Description : The Nehru Memorial Museum and Library cordially invites you to a Public Lecture on ‘The Naga Peace Process : Moving towards a settlement or further crisis’ by Prof. Sajal Nag, Senior Fellow, NMML.

Abstract : The Naga struggle for their right to self determination has been one of the oldest self-assertion movements in South Asia. It posed the foremost challenge to the nascent Indian nation-state. It is the first and longest of the secessionist-turned-insurgency movements in South Asia that challenged the concept of unity-in-diversity invoked by the post colonial Indian nation state. The Nagas, a small tribe living in the Indo-Myanmar frontier, defined themselves as a separate nation from the Indian nation and demanded the right to self determination. Denied self determination, the Nagas appropriated the politics of secessionism to achieve the goal of Naga nation-state. The Indian state’s use of military power to repress the movement pushed it underground, transforming it into an organized armed insurgency. It was the beginning of a sixty year old confrontation between the Naga underground and the Indian State.  Since then there have been a number of initiatives and accords signed between the state and Naga leadership to bring an end to the war and settle down to normal life. None of which however has brought the desired peace. From 1997 a ceasefire agreement was signed between the two parties following which negotiations had started for a lasting solution to the vexed Naga problem. But even after 13 years of negotiations and ceasefire the hope of peace seemed to be fading away. In fact it has snowballed into a major crisis for the Naga people threatening to disintegrate the Naga people. This lecture would proposes to present an update on the peace negotiations, the possibility of a lasting solution if any and why the negotiations are taking that long to find a settlement. It will highlight the crisis that the peace negotiations had created within the Naga community and its ramification on the peace negotiations.

Speaker : Prof.  Sajal Nag is Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at the Department of History, Assam University, Silchar and is currently Senior Fellow, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library. His publications include, India and North East India: Mind, Politics ad the Process of Integration 1946-1950, 1998 and Pied Pipers in North East India: Bamboo Flowers, Rat Famine and the Politics of Environment in North East India, 2008.  Nation and its Oppressions: Modes of Nation Building in Colonial and Post-Colonial South Asia is  his forthcoming publication.

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