HISTORICALLY speaking, the idea of conflict as a sociological category arrived a little late in Northeast Indian academia – around the 1970s. It was a welcome departure from the earlier studies of colonial anthropological understanding, which placed conflict or absence of it,¹ on the very ‘nature’ of the tribes and their ‘primitive’ character. It is difficult to elaborate here the specific conditions which prompted such a turn. Suffice it to say that in postcolonial India, the socio-political movements in the late Nehruvian period, and international conflicts such as the Indo-China war and the creation of Bangladesh, affected the region more intimately as the ‘frontier’ of the Indian nation state and acted as catalysts to rethink categories which were assumed as given. The idea of Northeast as an administrative category should not blind one to the diversity of each state in the region despite the seemingly commonsensical mapping of the region as a homogeneous ‘bloc’ of the mainland from a policy-maker’s perspective.

The region’s political geography, however, can broadly be delineated under two changing and yet constant themes: the idea of territorial sovereignty and the socio-political process of migration. These two themes encompass not just the usual meaning of the terms that are subsumed under international relations and understood largely from a geopolitical perspective, but are related intrinsically to a gap between indigenous understanding of land rights and customary laws, and the imperatives of modern govern-mentality. So, in that sense, these two ideas have transposed and produced a series of related but distinct events and political discourses in almost the entire region in postcolonial times reshaping its internal administrative divisions and contours. For instance, if up in the hills of Nagaland and Mizoram one witnessed the emergence of underground militant networks demanding territorial sovereignty in the 1950s, in the plains of the Brahmaputra valley it was a civil disobedience movement (loosely characterized) against immigrants in 1980s, which eventually translated to a demand for sovereignty by the 1990s. So, by 1980s, the region witnessed an eruption of various discourses of regional nationalism and identity formation with overlapping claims of territoriality that drew upon from the discourse of rights and had become the dominant tropes of politics.

The Northeast Indian academic response to such a political process initially started with questions of land as a resource, and thereby a source of competition, conflict and dispute. There was an awareness that the process of modernization (colonial) had profoundly changed land relations, and in postcolonial India attempts to modify tribal customs and practices further complicated the situation. Anthropologist B. Datta Ray, in his foreword to Land Relations in North-East India, one of the first volumes on the subject, declared the basic focus of the time: ‘For this purpose, objective and empirical researches on the traditional system of land tenure and land relations of the different tribal groups are called for.’²

 

The volume is a compilation of papers from a conference on the subject that was held in Shillong in 1981. One of the earliest conferences on the subject, the presentations discussed almost all the states of the region – many having received statehood only recently – on the various themes of existing land relations: ownership, inheritance, alie-nations, indebtedness, land as an exchangeable commodity, involvement of both tribal and non-tribal groups in these exchanges, and how such processes had led to growing inequality in the distribution of land in the tribal society. The theme of land as a potential source of conflict received further attention from the academic fraternity, particularly in the aftermath of Nellie massacre of 1983 – one of the worst in postcolonial India. It was believed that such desperate violence was triggered by growing land alienation among the tribal and indigenous peasant communities in Assam (in this case the Tiwa and other local communities of central Assam.)³

Two serious interventions followed immediately: one, in the form of a national conference on land alie-nation and indebtedness, held in Guwahati (1984) and the second, a report on the survey of alienation of tribal lands in Assam (finally published in 1999). Both the initiatives were led by Dr B.N. Bordoloi, the energetic director of the Assam Institute of Research for Tribals and Scheduled Castes. As many as fifteen papers were presented with a few special lectures followed by detailed discussions with both academicians and administrators. The conference had also recommended some measures to curb the problem of land alienation and indebtedness among the tribal people.

 

The call to find a legal alternative to prohibiting the transfer of tribal lands to non-tribals outside the tribal belts and blocks, and other scheduled areas, and the recovery of illegally transferred land, was overwhelming at the conference. It also suggested a limit on the transfer of land (not more than seven hectares) to the non-tribal. To further curb moneylending activities, it recommended a detailed study of the institution of the village mahajan. A recommendation was also made to study and codify customary laws relating to land management and proprietorship. It also recommended rehabilitation of displaced tribal people due to the ‘installation of industrial and irrigational complexes’, instead of paying cash compensation with compulsory employment of ‘at least one able bodied member of the affected families in such complexes.’⁴ The deliberations of the conference and its recommendations have been mentioned in some detail as these engagements and concerns continued to be constant concerns of identity politics and governance in the region for many years thereafter, reflecting the incompleteness of ‘solutions’ in the present system.

 

The second book of the volume continued with the same themes, and it is still recommended as one of the primary books on the subject of land alienation and indebtedness of tribal population in Northeast India. It is a sample survey of 25 villages both within and outside of the tribal blocks/belts and scheduled areas to understand the extent of alienation of tribal land. The findings of the survey suggest an overwhelming magnitude of land alienation in the state of Assam.⁵ Many of these themes continued in many different forms across several disciplines.⁶ A relatively sidelined issue of enquiry, which has received considerable attention recently, is the theme of development-induced displacement.⁷ These studies empirically confirm the extent of displacement and rehabilitation due to development projects in the entire northeastern region.⁸

 

With the growing focus on nationalism and identity in the political domain, particularly on the eve of the Assam movement (1979-1985), the study of nationalism or regional nationalism began to enter the academic politics of the region. In fact, one of the pioneering works on nationalism in South Asia has come from this part of the world.⁹ Amalendu Guha’s work, Planter Raj to Swaraj marked a beginning in the study of nationalism in the region. The book was published in 1977, which coincided with the time when the idea of identity and autonomy strained relations between the Indian nation-state at the Centre and the Northeast region – projected as vital to its project and interests, and yet ‘peripheral’ to its concerns. The Assam movement was just around the corner.

Guha’s study looked at the two sides of national identities by critically engaging with the colonial archive. Setting the tone for conflict studies, he traced the imperial capital’s interest in the region and analysed how deeply alienating it was in terms of capitalist development of the region. Given the imperial tea plantation capital’s alienating nature in the Brahmaputra valley, Guha argued that it did not develop any deep linkage with the traditional sector, either through capital, labour or commodity. This alienating nature of capital, Guha claimed, has made ‘capitalist growth… fragmented, weak and uneven,’ while on the other hand, for the long-standing imperial capital’s interest in the region, the colonial policy had also encouraged ethnicity to ‘play a divisive role’, so as to ‘hinder the growth of (Indian) Nationalism’, in the region.

 

In such a historical context, Guha argued, nationalism in India ‘was simultaneously along two intertwined tracks’, the great and little nationalism, one is grounded ‘in a feeling of all India unity’ while the other was based on ‘regional-linguistic identity.’¹⁰ However, ‘despite the strains and stress in their relationship’, Guha claimed the region ‘moved in unison towards a fusion.’ Despite its deep insight on the archive and the role of imperial capital in the area, Guha’s account is indeed evolutionary and historicist. In doing so, he undermines the performative nature of capital, which was based on certain contingent operative principles, thereby producing different meanings and identities in the process through the category of the ‘primitive’. Without such a critical gaze, the self-representation of capital itself remains unchallenged and is reproduced as such in academic expositions.

Sanjib Barua’s book India Against Itself was published at the height of the insurgency and state repression in the region.¹¹ The book discusses the historical and contemporary context of Assamese nationalism, its structure of contestation with the Indian state and pan-Indian nationalism. The author has also delved into a relatively ignored side of this story: the structure and process of political mobilization among the Bodos, one of the important communities of the Brahmaputra Valley, and their struggle for cultural and political autonomy against the dominant Assamese sub-national politics. With a nuanced and mature understanding of the process of conflict, the book provides a much needed critique of ‘nation building’ or for that matter, the Indian state’s policies towards the region that was intended to ‘make the case for designing structures of policy making implicit in the notion of federalism.’ Contesting Guha, he argues that these different secessionist movements were the result of political mismanagement rather than structural disjuncture and at the same time, these challenges were articulations of specific sub-national aspiration which could not be subsumed under a pan-Indian narrative. In short, what Baruah argues is that sub-national politics is a reality and contra Guha, he believes that instead of moving ‘in unison toward a fusion’, an acceptance of it by the Indian state could help resolve such conflicts.

 

Here, mention must be made of an old, relatively ignored, book by Hiren Gohain, Assam: A Burning Question, published in 1985, at a time when the Assam ‘agitation’ concluded with an accord that guaranteed resolution by the Indian state of some Assamese sub-national anxieties. Gohain was a fierce critic of the Assam movement and Assamese chauvinist nationalism in its initial days. However, despite the book’s structure – in the mode of political commentary – its central argument is more productive and sound than those propounded by his contemporaries. Declaring that the national left had failed to understand the complexities of the ‘national question’ in Assam, he claimed that the development of ‘nationalist forces are more powerful and influential than class forces’¹² The reason for such a situation had much to do with deep-rooted anxieties of the Assamese people due to several historical contingencies.

By tracing the roots of a popular democratic national consciousness to the local neo-Vaisnavite Satra networks, and its continuation under the colonial condition when the Assamese language warriors envisaged a ‘popular’ literature, Gohain, argued this context as a site of political struggle instead of attempting a closure. In fact, he blamed the Indian state for the stunted development of Assamese nationalism and for disengaging from it politically by superseding its political leadership. Despite the book’s radical political position, its historicism actually reproduces the same essentialism it wants to interrogate.

 

The above-mentioned works have helped develop a critical understanding of nationalism and identity in the region. They lay the ground for how to look at the question of conflict in the region and its probable resolution. However, the works that deal with the subject of territoriality and the idea of misrecognition (of customs) by the colonial and Indian state, continue to be the theme of academic enquiry in the area. In a recent essay, historian Bodhisattva Kar has interrogated essentialist ideas of categories and identities by tracing the contracts between the British East India Company and ‘primitive’ communities, highlighting how the category was ‘brought into being, variously reformatted and dissolved.’ Such archival insights, he argues, provides the clue for an analytical framework of what he calls ‘speculative tribes: conjured communities of risk.’ In other words, instead of an a priori community, Kar suggestes how imperial capital produced communities and its territorial claims through commercial and political contracts. Such an understanding could help in rethinking nationalism, identity and claims of territoriality in the region in a more complicated way.¹³

 

Peace and Conflict Studies as a discipline of study and a way of social and political engagement arrived rather late in this part of the world. Probably, the North Eastern Social Research Centre (NESRC), a Guwahati based academic institute, has pioneered this kind of research and engagement. Actual engagement in the field, publication of books on the basis of field experience, training of local researchers from the remotest parts of the Northeast, were some of the critical activities that the centre initiated. Of course, over the years, the Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change and Development in Guwahati, also joined in, followed by different universities in the region. The experience of this research and engagement was critical because for the first time in the history of conflict or conflict studies in the region, the actual perpetrators or victims seemed to be engaging with academicians and researchers.

These experiences have produced a more nuanced, layered structure to study conflict and peace in the region. Instead of a close, disciplinary approach towards the object of the study, it has provided everyday experiences and insights by researchers, who themselves were witness and subject to the conflict and peace-making processes. However, an understanding of conflict and the glowing stories of peace need to be seen in a critical perspective and methodology. Recent works, particularly in anthropology and history, using cultural anthropological methods has critically contributed in this direction.¹⁴ These studies have helped revise our understanding of politics through commonsensical narratives, cultural practices and their appropriation within the larger discourse of the social.

 

An example of insights drawn from everyday experiences is a small booklet titled Violence and Search for Peace in Karbi Anglong, Assam. Written by a missionary priest, the book records unfolding events with an eye for detail by exploring the contours of the Karbi-Dimasa conflict of 2005. The major strength of this book is its convincing narrative, which traces rumours and incidents that build up to the final moment of the clashes with a deep awareness of how different players participated in the conflict. Refusing to accept the usual victim-perpetrator binary, the author traverses into a more uncharted territory where the failure of the state does not perpetuate as a simple narrative of lawlessness, but more of a contingent production of different actors with different intentions. Since the state fails in its task, he explains, ‘People hardly react when some militants punish corrupt government officials or politicians through their own courts.’

The book has some deep insights on tactics and strategies, of actual articulation of political discourses, a commonsense grounding of politics, and how different actors navigate and work. The author refuses to believe that communalism or ethnic violence has any a priori legacy, and emphasizes different strategic and contingent political possibilities that may trigger such violence. An example of such a strategic culmination is what he describes as ‘many suspect that the conflict was meant to subvert the joint demand for an autonomous state of Karbi and Dimasa communities. In other words, there were larger contingent strategies of governance at play in seemingly local conflicts. In the aftermath of the conflict, a participatory rural appraisal was conducted through a peace team in the Manja area of the Karbi Anglong district, the centre of the Karbi-Dimasa conflict. The survey also suggests that low-income, poor living conditions and high indebted-ness of the population, have become a source of competition between the ethnic communities, and these factors also helped trigger the conflict as the author concluded.¹⁵

 

Another interesting volume on the peace and conflict process in Northeast India, and one of the earliest, focuses on ethnic conflicts in three states of the region.¹⁶ It was a welcome departure from the apparent nationalist struggles, and focuses on the growing realization that instead of charity and relief works, ‘the situation has to be understood first hand.’ The chapters are based on field studies by young students and researchers, who attempt to understand the issues and suggest a range of possible peace initiatives. However, despite the volumes’ inadequacy in analysis of the subjects of enquiry, as the editor of the volume himself warns, it helps ‘one to identify the main concerns that these conflict expresses.’ A summary of the Assam-Nagaland border dispute demonstrates why a case study with an everyday experience is important. When Nagaland was formed in 1963, the border itself became a site of dispute. As a result, conflict has prevailed between Assam and Nagaland for more than five decades. The different actors, including the police, paramilitary forces, political parties, militant outfits, and even ordinary people have tried to exploit the situation. As there are oil-bearing lands on both sides, control over the area became more important for both states than the security of its own citizens. The study unfolds a complicated narrative of resource politics with a clear gaze on how different actors operate in the everyday nature of violence.

In this context, it would be useful to refer to a small booklet on the peace curriculum in Manipur for its significance. A survey based investigation on peace education in Manipur, has the respondents question the inadequate, majoritarian view of Manipur’s educational policy. The author describes how textbooks are used as a tool of cultural imposition of the Meiteis, the dominant community of the state. Tribal history is conveniently ignored and importance is given only to the history and scripts of the valley.¹⁷ The importance of socio-cultural values like tolerance, empathy, conflict resolution through discussion, which are the standard criteria of any peace curriculum, cannot be overemphasized, but without understanding this kind of significant structural problem, the critical issue of justice could not be raised. These interventions help provide clues to a more intimate, everyday understanding of conflict and justice in this region.

 

This short note on peace making in the Northeast is neither exhaustive nor adequate in comparison to the growing literature on the subject. The selection was based on familiarity of political process and the archives. Many themes, particularly gender issues, could not be included.¹⁸ However, we have attempted to delineate the historical context and basic terrain of conflicts, or more accurately conflict studies, in the region: land, nationalism, identity politics and ethnic violence, largely focusing on the state of Assam. The reason for underlining these specificities and complexities is to emphasize their significance in the academic politics of the region.

 

The specific context of each state, the discursive and material condition for the articulation of the idea of immigration or ‘outsiders’ as a ‘burden’ – their nuances and multiple layers are contingent to both academic and political processes in the region. Specificity need not be special, nor has it to be natural or authentic and original. Its articulation within a particular historical moment and how different actors provide clues to its organization is, however, more critical than a naïve, commonsensical understanding of it. Without being attentive to them, the politics of peace and conflict often reads either as a simple narrative of lack of development, or as a demand of some unruly, and xenophobic citizens of the nation. The example of majoritarian articulation in the education system of Manipur is a glaring reminder of structural indifference, inequalities within the growing academic politics of territorial specificity, and questions of misrecognition. If the discursive notion of specificity is politically critical in Northeast Indian academia, then a total politics of justice is significant for widening the vision of that specificity. An awareness of a total politics of justice, perhaps, gives peace a chance than anything else.

 

Footnotes:

1. Prafulladatta Gowsami, The Folk Literature of Assam. Lawyers Book Stall, Gauhati, 1954.

2. B.B. Dutta and M.N. Karma (eds.), Land Relations in North-East India. People’s Publishing House, New Delhi, 1987.

3. Makiko Kimura, The Nellie Massacre of 1983: Agency of Rioters. Sage Publication, New Delhi, 2013.

4. B.N. Bordoloi (eds.), Alienation of Tribal Land and Indebtedness. Tribal Research Institute of Assam, Guwahati, 1986.

5. B.N. Bordoloi, Report on the Survey of Alienation of Tribal Land in Assam. Assam Institute of Research for Tribals and Scheduled Castes, Guwahati, 1999.

6. Amalendu Guha, Medieval and Early Colonial Assam: Society, Polity and Economy. Anwesha Publication, Guwahati, 2015; Walter Fernandes, Joydeep Baruah and Augustin Millik, Ownership, Management and Alienation: Tribal Land in North East India. Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change, Guwahati and Northeastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati, 2019; Walter Fernandes and Sanjay Barbora (eds.), Land, People and Politics: Contest Over Tribal Land in North East India. North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati, 2018; Arup Saikia, Forest and Ecological History of Assam. Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2011.

7. Walter Fernandes and Gita Bharali, Uprooted for Whose Benefit? Development Induced Displacement in Assam 1947-2000. North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati, 2011.

8. Walter Fernandes, George Thadathil and Bitopi Dutta, The Teesta on the Run: Displacement-Induces Development in Sikkim 1975-2000. North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati, 2016.

9. Amalendu Guha, ‘The Indian National Question: A conceptual Frame’, Economic and Political Weekley 17(31), 31 July 1982.

10. Amalendu Guha, Planter Raj to Swaraj: Freedom Struggle and Electoral Politics in Assam 1826-1947. Tulika Books, New Delhi, 2006.

11. Sanjib Baruah, India Against Itself: Assam and Politics of Nationality. Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 1999.

12. Hiren Gohain, Assam: A Burning Question. Spectrum Publication, Guwahati, 1985.

13. Bodhisattva Kar, ‘Nomadic Capital and Speculative Tribes: A Culture of Contracts in the Northeastern Frontier of British India’, The Indian Economic and Social History Review 53(1), 2016, pp. 41-67.

14. Dolly Kikon, Living with Oil and Coal: Resource Politics and Militarization in Northeast India. University of Washington Press, Seattle, 2019; Amit R. Baishya, Contemporary Literature from Northeast India: Deathworlds, Terror and Survival. Routledge, London and New York, 2019.

15. Tom Mangattuthazhe, Violence and Search for Peace in Karbi Anglong, Assam. North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati, 2008.

16. Lazar Jayseelan (ed.), Conflict Mapping and Peace Process in Northeast India. North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati, 2008.

17. Leban Serto, Teaching for Peace and Peace Curriculum in Manipur. North Eastern Social Research Centre, Guwahati, 2011.

18. Rakhee Kalita Moral, ‘The Woman Rebel and the State: Making War, Making Peace in Assam’, Economic and Political Weekly 49(43-44), 1 November 2014.