The people have spoken

In the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls 2024, each and every important policy decisions of the BJP led NDA government alienated the people of Nagaland. This, today, your’s truly can say for sure. The Nagaland BJP leaders, riding tall on their respective high horses, never got to know the pulse of the people. They remained arrogant, confident in their power, financial muscle, oratory prowess, ever confident and obeying ever word of their bosses in Nagpur and New Delhi. They had the illusion that very soon, they will become the masters of Nagaland, and all that they needed to do was bow and worship the self-styled and self-declared Hindu deity called Narendra Modi, and the Naga public will simply follow.
Nagas are not communal people. People of Nagaland respects all relegion. We do not usually react even when disrespected. We embrace all hues, all parties, but that does not mean that we will sell our self-respect. We do not tolerate interfering in our way of living, and, in our Christian faith.
There are many but just two issues can sums up all. The decision of the BJP led central government to scrap the free movement regime (FMR) and to fence the India-Myanmar border is one of it. To the Nagas, it was a betrayal. A ‘Mir Jafar’ betrayal. To physically divide the Nagas who had all been peacefully existing even after 71 long years of mental division in the 1950s when Nagas were arbitrarily divided into India and Burma with an imaginary line, was totally unacceptable to the Nagas. To the Naga people, the contention of the Centre that the decision was made to check insurgency and drug smuggling made no sense. One size never fits all. Whose size did the Centre try to make the Nagas fit into? Or maybe, it was the hidden agenda of the BJP of checking the influx of Christian population in the North Eastern states in the name of national security that simply came to the fore. This is what the Nagas understood and the shoe does not fit us.
It was also not lost on the Nagas that the Centre took that unilateral decision to scrap the Free Movement Regime and fence the Indo-myanmar border without consulting the state which is protected by Article 371(A). The safeguarding article had guaranteed that unless the Nagaland Legislative Assembly (NLA) adopt a resolution to the effect, the Centre cannot impose it’s will upon the Nagas. A simple example: the Centre imposes it’s free will in Manipur because the state has a BJP Chief Minister which is not the case with Nagaland.
The RSS controlled BJP led NDA government of India had the illusion that with the Nagaland state BJP an equal stakeholder to governance in Nagaland, and the propensity of Nagaland BJP leaders to carry their Christian faith simply folded up in their sleeves, the time was ripe for Hinduism to exert its presence in Nagaland just as it happened in nextdoor Manipur. The Centre forgot that Nagas are the most autonomous of all the tribes in the North-East and that for the Nagas their Christian faith is uncompromiseable. We Nagas will eat grass and die but not compromise with our Christian faith.
Looking back before lok sabha elections 2024, the BJP, having assured itself of atleast 370 lok sabha seats and above 400 with it’s allies went on a rampaging mission mode to enslave the minds of the Christians in the North-East. Evidently, as per the events that unfolded, the party empowered the Assam Chief Minister, Himanta Biswa Sarma to continue the (dirty) work in the North-East. The ‘Assam Healing (Prevention of Evil) Practices Bill 2024’ was thus passed by the Assam Legislative Assembly. The Assam CM stated that the Bill would be an important milestone to curb evengalism in Assam and criminalize ‘magical healing’ by eliminating non-scientific healing practices, even when Christianity had nothing to do with magic.
The self-contradictory, misleading, and discriminatory statement of the Assam CM which was totally communal in character reflected the true motive of the Bill which was to criminalize Christianity, and specifically target Christians. The Christian healing ministry involves both scientific as well as divine practices through prayer for healing in response to human sufferings and pain, and not to proselytise. Himanta Biswa Sarma need a little more study and he will then see and realize that the long historical holistic endeavour of Christians serving humanity and upliftment of the poor, the marginalized, and the downtrodden is an indisputable fact.
On the face of the disastrous result of the Lok Sabha election in Nagaland and in the North-East for the BJP, Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma had pointedly stated that Christian leaders worked against the ruling alliance. The statement was surprising because what did Himanta Biswa Sarma expect? Even more surprising was when nobody dared to call a spade, a spade, even when provoked. Christian leaders everywhere in India were certainly not amused by the blatant anti-christian rhetoric and the real-life atrocities on Christians, it’s affiliates, Churches and properties. What happened in Manipur was in itself a wake-up call. In Nagaland, Christian leaders did voice concerns for Christians and other minorities in the country by appealing to the people to exercise moral obligation and vote against communal forces working against Christians in India. On a personal level, I felt that the Church could have done more. That the NDPP lost the lok sabha election in Nagaland, however, cannot be credited to the Church since it was the concious vote of the Nagas that yielded the result. The high handed overconfident pitch of the Nagaland BJP leaders that took winning of the state government’s consensus candidate as a fore-gone conclusion also proved to be its own undoing in the final analysis.
Lok Sabha elections apart, the Nagaland ULB polls 2024 has proved to be the ‘real’ eye-opener. The dance of democracy where 10 political parties and independents participated, where leaders of every hue from every nook and corner of Nagaland (except the eastern Nagas), men and women, young and old, made felt their presence in society by standing as candidates of councils and municipalities, and where the public, ultimately, decided about what was exactly good and right for Nagaland.
Credit goes to the Rio led PDA government for having passed the newer version of the Nagaland Municipal Act in the Assembly as empowered by Art. 371(A) and which enabled the holding of ULB 2024 in Nagaland with 33% women reservation. Credit to Naga women that 8 of them won out of unreserved seats. The result of Nagaland ULB polls 2024 has also validated and proved that the voters are more knowledgeable than the politicians of where and what Nagas need to be, and be wary about.
The result shows that the public wants the NDPP to do some soul searching. Our Christian faith cannot be sacrificed at the altar of party politics for the sake of power. The people have spoken.
Benito Z Swu, Thilixu village