Are The Gun Days Gone In Northeast India

The Northeast has been relatively peaceful this year with significant drop in insurgency related fatalities and activities. With this changing scenario, there is a voice in support of paradigm shift in the Northeastern region’s security policy which has been largely defined or modeled along anti-insurgency.

During his addressed in the inaugural session of the 26th conference of the police chiefs of the northeastern states of India which took off in Dimapur, Governor of Nagaland, RN Ravi called for a paradigm shift in the Northeastern region’s security policy which has been largely defined or modeled along anti insurgency. “The paradigm of security in the northeast is changing and we can see the change. Till some years back insurgency was the core theme. Now, things have improved considerably,” he said while adding that the consolidation of the improvement in security has begun already. RN Ravi’s remarks is significant not because he is the current Governor of Nagaland, but because of his past engagement with Nagaland peace process. Ravi who retired as special director of the Intelligence Bureau in 2012, was the Centre’s interlocutor in 2015, when the government signed a framework agreement for a settlement of the Naga question with the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isaac-Muivah), the largest of the Naga armed groups.

RN Ravi’s remark came in just few days after the extension of Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSA) in Assam in the pretext of Assam being a disturbed state. In the end of August, in an official communique, Assam state government stated, “Consequent upon review of law and order situation in Assam, in the past six months, the State Government vide a Notification issued to this effect by the Home & Political Department, Assam and as per Section 3 of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958, has declared the entire State of Assam as “Disturbed Area” w.e.f 28-08-2019 upto six months unless withdrawn earlier”. Continuation of AFSA in Northeast India actually contradicts what RN Ravi’s stated, but at the same time it cannot be denied that there is significant drop in insurgency activities in the Northeast.

Data does not lie