Naga Talks: "Final settlement" to be inked by Independence Day?

Guwahati: If reports are to be believed, the Central Government is keen to ink a final deal with the Naga stakeholders by August 15 (Independence Day).

According to reports, the Centre has invited representatives of the Isaak-Muivah faction of the Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN-IM) for a round of talks in Delhi on Friday to close the 23-year-old Naga peace process.

The meeting in all likelihood shall also be attended by representatives of Assam, Manipur and Arunachal -- parts of which the outfit claims are "Naga areas" and the envisioned "greater Nagalim."

The territorial integration of all Naga inhabited areas of the northeast has been the primary demand of the NSCN (I-M). However, this has been met with protests by locals in the respective states having territories which the Naga body claims should be a part of the Greater Nagalim. Protests rocked Manipur towards the fag end of last year when the NSCN (I-M) leaders sat down with the Central Government's representatives to try and arrive at a deal.

NSCN (IM)'s general secretary Thuengaleng Muivah, who has been in Delhi since July 20 for medical treatment, is likely to once again lead the negotiations. Meanwhile, the Naga National Political Groups (NNPG), a conglomerate of seven other organisations participating in the dialogue, said it had already closed its negotiations with the Centre.

The NSCN (I-M) has blamed R N Ravi, the interlocutor of the peace talks and the Governor of Nagaland, for the delay in the signing of the "final settlement."

In an August 3 statement, the insurgent outfit, putting the blame squarely on the shoulder of Ravi, said, "What has driven the Naga people far away from Ravi is his deceptive manner of handling the FA as he deceitfully went beyond the call of the interlocutor to indulge himself in playing divisive game among the Nagas to dismantle the very foundation of FA."

The NSCN (I-M) also claimed that five years down the line (of signing the Framework Agreement), "the scourge of manipulation, misinterpretation and insincerity has kept the pot boiling."

Ravi, for his part, has blamed the insurgents for their "procrastinating attitude" to delay the settlement "raising the contentious symbolic issues of separate Naga national flag and constitution on which they are fully aware of the Government of India's position."

Ravi's relationship with the Neiphiu Rio-led ruling dispensation also seems to have hit a rocky patch after the Governor, in a letter to the CM proposed that "important law and order decisions like the transfer and posting of officials entrusted with the maintenance of law and order… of and above the district level will be after the approval of the governor."

The Governor also complained about the system of taxation levied in Nagaland by the NSCN (I-M) and other armed outfits. He further complained to Rio about ""unrestrained depredations by over half a dozen organized armed gangs, brazenly running their respective so-called 'governments', challenging the legitimacy of the state government without any resistance from the state law and order machinery."

At Ravi's behest, the Nagaland Government also issued a circular in June asking state government employees to declare if any of their family members are members of armed outfits.

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