Remembering the Present: Maps,Identity and Memory in Naga Politics

Remembering the Present: Maps, Identity and Memory in Naga Politics

The past is particularly significant in the study of identities as it has relevance both in the collective memory and in the remembering of the present we live in. There is a dearth of literatures on memory studies that brings together culture, collective memory and politics in the regional knowledge production on the Nagas.

Literature suggests that it was Maurice Halbwachs (1980) who first theorised collective memory premise on the parallel functions of memory and history. He argued that although both memory and history deals with the scientific understanding of the past, memory is more plural and he critiqued the science of history as singular memories (Halbwachs in Berger and Niven 2014, 137). However, according to Green (2004), Halbwach’s theory of collective memory theorised memory from a functionalist mechanism that cements identity, ignoring the conflicting and antagonistic memories (Green 2004, 38). But the existence of multiple groups within a society is bound to have competing memories. In this article, collective remembering is used as a source and method that accesses the past otherwise unrecorded, using oral history, survey and in-depth interviews of competing narratives. Memories makes an entry point to the past which is not just a product of neurological process, but the remembering or the retrieval of the past is influenced by present emotions, experiences and are subjected to socio-political influences. Memory as a source of data and analysis of narratives unravels the political meaning behind the production of the memory. The way the narrator remembers gives legitimacy to the recalled data when validated by shared and community memory (Lynn 2014, 89–91, 95). However, the focus is not on the narrator, but the field of life narratives within oral history moves towards mental schemas of remembering and inner scripts given by our social lives, cultural narratives, politics and myths (Green 2004, 35–6).

The article begins with a brief political and historical background and generational analysis of the Nagas. The Framework of the article in the main sections discusses how culture, maps and geographies define political identity and nationhood for the Nagas. Drawing from Thongchai Winichakul’s (1994) work and his conception of geo-body, the article examines how the geo-body of Nagaland is a political construct. New geographies of the modern state map has not only displaced the territoriality but the ideologies of Naga Nationalism. The geo-body and carving out of a separate cartography ‘Nagaland’ in 1963 brought sixteen recognized Naga tribes under the Government of Nagaland, administratively separated from the Nagas of Manipur, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Myanmar. Maps are ‘tools of spatial representation’, and the politics of map making and the construction of spaces in human geography is almost always contested (van Schendel 2002: 651).

What are the stories and historical events that have influenced the memory of the first generation Nagas? Which memory is passed down to the second generation Nagas? Does it waver from the dominant historical Naga politics? Important structural agencies that influences the collective memory of the Nagas includes: (a) Colonials—the British state and the Church; (b) 1947—the Indian state; (c) 1963—the birth of the new state Nagaland; and (d) the market after the 1990s. Immediate years after India’s independence was a period of assembling ‘one Naga identity’, which contradicts to the period after 1963 that witnessed splintered and contested Naga identities. These chronological years are not to be seen as historical ruptures but to be seen in continuity, progression in dismantling inherited history. The article captures the narratives of different generations of Naga tribes to gauge fine nuances that links their collective memory with their present political scenario. Memory of the first generation Nagas corresponds to First and Second World War, colonialism and the church. The second generation Nagas are divided between—(a) Naga Nationalism; and (b) the year 1963: the official declaration of statehood and the beginning of modern electoral politics. For collective memory to sustain, according to Fulbrook (2014), ‘Communities of Identification’ need not necessarily have personal experience or have a direct personal links with historical events. Rather they draw their memories from normative, emotional and cognitive links (Fulbrook 2014). Memory does not wane with aspects of temporality and the need to have a personal experience is not a limitation to society’s remembering of any event. What is remembered are those that are appropriated by the present.

Generational Analysis: Collective Remembering of the Nagas

Key historical events become meaningful when remembered since it is connected with one’s identity and when shared, it becomes collective identity or social memories (Griffin 2004, 545). The first-generation Naga middle class experienced the Second World War personally, the experience of which has not been fully recovered. A first generation Naga, narrated his experience of the second World War,

My mother did not remember the date I was born and she said I was born during the harvest season. I was a child then but who will not remember the Second World War. It was only in 1944 that the War reached our village. I remember the British soldiers covering our entire village. I saw ai-kukulu (meaning Jeep in Sumi Naga dialect) for the first time when the Britishers drove it. It was during the Second World War, we witnessed modern warfare and lots of soldiers in our land for the first time: we witnessed bombings, arms and ammunition in huge scale.

Sociologists have now ventured into the area of collective memories and its importance: the memory that is remembered, forgotten and resurrected (Schuman and Rodgers 2004). The first-generation Nagas not only recalled important national and international events but they are also the bearers of the Naga political history. The first generation Nagas who survived the Second World War remembers it vividly. An 84 year old Naga man ¹ narrated,

My uncle was shot by the Japanese because he was escorting the British. He was leading the British soldiers and was like a voluntary road scout but the Japanese shot him. The Japanese would always come out from the forest and would go back in to the forest. The British later awarded his father the order of British Empire (OBE) for his son’s service to the British Empire.

Such wilful remembering has remained in their memory and has become an integral part of their autobiography and identity. A collective remembering of the first generation and the second generation Nagas elucidates how the Nagas negotiates with their past. Remembering the past and historical significance recorded in the knowledge body is not the same thing and is not always related (Griffin 2000, 554, emphasis is mine). Rather, remembered narratives construct and re-constructs the past in both the case of the first generation Nagas and the second generation Nagas to make sense of their present identity.

The living history of the Nagas and the way the Nagas remember 1947 today stands apart from India’s remembering of the 1947. Having a distinct race, ethnic identity, and being linguistically ² and culturally different dates back to their first experience in the First World War on their voyage to France as part of the Indian Labour corps. Today, encounters and interactions of the Nagas with the Indian state and the people is entagled with racism and militarisation. The emergence of the first generation Naga middle class can be traced back to the formation of the Naga Club in the year 1918 at Kohima and a branch at Mokokchung. The Naga Club was the first and the only Naga organisation in 1918 that brought together all the Naga tribes and was an expression of Naga social and cultural solidarity (Aier 2006, 82). It was at this point of history that the Nagas came together and formed a collective identity called ‘the Nagas’. The inception of Naga club gave birth to the politics of Naga identity which ultimately became the driving force behind Naga National movement. The Nagas first asserted their political identity in their first memorandum, submitted to the Simon Commission (Submitted to the British Indian Government by Naga Club) in 1929.

What was happening in the Naga Hills when India was celebrating its Independence in 1947? The Nagas lived experience in 1947 tells the story of a period of political unrest, history of betrayal, deadlock political bargainings and the period of deception for the Nagas. Such memories aligns with the writings on the political negotiations of the Nagas with Nehru (Nag 2009). After 1947, the Naga Hills remained a part of the province of Assam. However, Naga Nationalist activities became active and the Indian state began negotiating with Naga representatives. In 1957, the Naga Hills Tuensang Area (NHTA) became a Union territory directly administered by the Central government. The constitution (thirteenth Amendment) Act, 1962, enacted by Parliament incorporated the state of Nagaland to the Union of India (Alemchiba 1973, 207).

The second generation Nagas could not associate with the memories of World Wars and Colonialism like the first generations did. When asked, many of the second-generation Nagas mostly remembered events like the birth of the new state 1963, the first general assembly elections 1964 and the onset of town committee elections and municipal council elections in the urban areas. The article is in line with Zerubavel’s (1996) argument that remembering is social and inter-subjective phenomenon, which goes beyond a personal phenomenon. The Nagas today have wavered from the collective remembering of 1918 Naga Club formation and have limited their remembering to the historical statehood of Nagaland. The year 1963 has an historical significance in understanding the splintered identities of the Nagas today. Naga National movement and the politics of exit continued even after ‘Nagaland’ was carved out as the 16th state of Indian union. The cartography of Nagaland excluded the Nagas inhabiting the present Manipur hills, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and the Nagas in Myanmar. ³ Past is not just locked in the memory but past reconstructs itself and glides into the present of the Nagas. For the second generation Nagas living in Nagaland, the year 1963 marks an affirmation of their adherence to the authority of the Indian state. On 1 December 1963, the state was inaugurated in Kohima by the President of India (Alemchiba 1973, 200–2). On one hand, statehood today is recalled as a compromise made to the idea of sovereign Naga Nation, and on the other hand there is a recalling of the statehood as the firm foundation of modern Naga society. The congress political party recalled, ‘the statehood gave the Nagas a sense of unity tied to their collective emotions, collective identity and political entity. It was seen as an iconic progress of the Nagas’ (Congress Committee 2001, 10).

Memory is an important interpretative meaning-making of political issues in the present (Griffin 2004, 550). The National Socialist Council of Nagaland—Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM) remembers 1947 as the year of forcibly dividing the Nagas and placing them in different administrative states. ‘The terms the Indian Nagas, Burmese Nagas, Manipur Nagas, Assam Nagas, Arunachal Nagas and Nagas of Nagaland state are derogatory language used by the colonialists’ (Singh 2020). These terms are not just political statements but have travelled into the everyday lingo of the Nagas themselves to segregate one another based on the administrative geo-body of the state. On one point, contrary to what Singh (2020) has argued, the field suggests that ‘Nagas of Nagaland’ is not a derogatory term. Of all the Nagas in different national and international geographical areas, the ‘Nagas of Nagaland’ enjoys the state identity, political security and citizenship, a resultant of carving out of a separate state Nagaland in 1963. In 1963, majority of the Naga leaders surrendered and joined different political ranks of the new Nagaland Government which is an important mark in the history of Naga National Movement. The new state formation opened the floodgates of statist power, money, Government grants and state resources to the Nagas inhabiting Nagaland (Singh 2004, 85). It paved way for party politics and electoral politics involving Naga politicians and Naga electorates, coupled with the proliferation of administration which was totally different from the traditional political structure of the Nagas (Aier 2006, 75, emphasis is mine).

Ideology, Cartography and the People

The Naga Hoho and the Nagaland Tribal Council (NTC) are the two apex voices of the Nagas. The Naga Hoho seeks to represent the homogenous identity of the Nagas, whereas the NTC represents mostly the voice of the Nagas from Nagaland. The first consultation meeting for Naga Hoho was first held on 25 June 1994 at Naga Club (NSF’s office) and the summit was formed at Wokha on 15 November 1994. Naga Hoho was finally constituted at Zunheboto session on 10–12 March 1998 with a motto ‘Nagas are one’. The effort was to bring the whole Nagas under one apex house. Fifty six delegates from United Naga council and delegates of all the 14 Naga tribes in Nagaland including the Tuensang & Mon People Organisation (TMPO) ⁴ participated and adopted a written constitution of Naga Hoho on the 11 of March 1998 (UNI 2019). The apex body, Naga Hoho, extends its membership to Nagas across the borders of Nagaland. The General Secretary of Naga Hoho E. Elu and President H. K. Zhimomi stated that ‘Nagas has sacrificed for Naga freedom movement irrespective of the state’s artificial borders between the Naga people’ (Singh 2019). The Naga Hoho upholds the view that Nagas were never part of India by conquest or consent, and the same shall remain even in the future.

On the contrary, Nagaland Tribes Council (NTC) accepts the state’s administrative boundaries and stands only for the Nagas of Nagaland. The ideology of NTC is supported mostly by the second generation Nagas in Nagaland. NTC’s ideology is a digression from Naga Hoho. The first generation Nagas in Nagaland still have their confidence with Naga Hoho although it is not blanketed due to variations even within the first generations. NTC was formed in Kohima only on the 12 October 2013, with Thepfulhouvi Solo as the first president and Nribemo Ngullie as general secretary. The convenor of NTC, P. Pius Lotha addressed the people,

NTC aims to foster unity, fraternity among the Naga brothers of ‘Nagaland’. The Naga Hoho was clearly against the formation of NTC, to which NTC reiterated the present political need of political platforms for Nagaland that could work in hand with other states and other organisations. (Nagaland Post 2019)

NTC has been keen in negotiating with the state in matters of official recognition of tribes and Schedule tribe status in Nagaland. Recalling the Government notification which accorded Rongmei Naga tribe as a recognised tribe in Nagaland (cabinet decision dated 23 July 2012), the NTC remained firm that it does not recognise any tribe from outside the Nagaland state. NTC asserted that it does not approve any recognition given by the State and demanded an abrogation of the Cabinet decision (Nagaland Today Online 2019a). A highly educated Naga woman in her late forties opined,

Naga Hoho is older than Nagaland tribal Council. It was more of a grass root movement formed with the idea of pan Naga identity. It had the popularity of people’s mandate at its height. NTC is based mostly in Urban areas although it claims support from the masses. It is one of the identity-based organisations formed as a political exigency among the Naga intellectuals. It also indirectly claims to be an alternative for underperforming Naga Hoho.

Naga Hoho, the apex body of Naga society seems to be losing its undisputed hold over ‘Naga identity’. While it does not accept the administrative State boundary created by the Indian state, organisations like NTC and Central Nagaland Tribes Council (CNTC) are guarding those boundaries in their political aspirations. Weakening of Naga Hoho and differences arising in core political ideologies resulted in splitting the Naga tribal organisations. Both Naga Hoho and NTC are parochial and patriarchal in their outlook. They are only male members organisations. Naga women are absent in the membership of both the apex bodies, resonating the traditional Naga political structure.

The Geo-Body ⁵ and Remembering the Brothers

According to James Young (2003), with or without the sacred historical sites, memorial sites, monuments, inscriptions, figures and places, memory evokes the past and engages in the present understanding of political identities. In the twenty-first century, the geo-body of Nagaland and its geographical division into central, eastern and western Nagaland reflects the present political alliances of Naga society. Different political organisations in Naga society resonates cultural and political alliances. Formations of ENPO, Tenyimia Nagas and CNTC are ideal types of constructing political identity along the geographies and cultural affinities. Organisations like the Naga Hoho and Tenyimia, posits their collective memory back to the formation of Naga club in 1918, formation of Naga National Council (NNC) ⁶ in 1945 who stood for unification of all Naga territories. While collective memory of Eastern Naga People’s Organisation (ENPO) is premised on the history and politics of neglect. The remembering of NTC and Central Nagaland Tribal council (CNTC) marks their political remembering to 1963. Their memory does not travel back much further than 1963 and places the cartography of Nagaland state mapped by the Indian state at the centre of their political discourses. This section investigates the ideological dilemmas of the second-generation Nagas in their engagement with politics and modern democratic processes.

Tenyimia: The Genealogical Tree

The Tenyimia ⁷ community is the largest borderless community of Naga tribes covering the districts of Kohima, Phek, and Peren in Nagaland, Senapati and Tamenglong districts in Manipur, and part of Cachar district in Assam that adjoins Tamenglong district of Manipur. Tenyimia Naga tribes comprises of ten Naga tribes: Angami. Chakhesang, Rengma, Zeliangrong, Pochury, Mao, Poumai, Maram, Thangal and Inpui tribes. The Angami tribe is the eldest, the big brother of tenyimia family and are the vanguard of tenyimia politics. According to Khutso (2018), Tenyimias traces a common ancestry from two villages known as Maikhel (Mekhrore) and Khezhakenoma. Common descent with shared memories, similar linguistic lineage and conjoined geographical spaces affirms Tenyimia identity (Khutso 2018). One of my respondents, a middle aged Angami Naga man from Kohima researching on Tenyimia said,

An identity of tenyimia is cultural, social and historical. There is brotherhood, friendship, peace, understanding and resignations from conflicts and differences among the people of tenyimia. We share signs, symbols, myths, legends, stories and cultural cues. This bond upholds our values, unity, peace and our ethos.

Reviving cultural identities and family genealogy requires a remembering of who are their brothers and forgetting who are not. These oral stories on ‘family’ and ‘brotherhood’ enters party politics only after these rememberings becomes pervasive in the community. Tenyimia has been in the discourse of identity politics in Nagaland, with Nagaland People Front (NPF) ⁸ being criticised by other organisation like ENPO for leaning towards Tenyimia identity politics (Suni 2013). NPF President and the former 11th Chief Minister of Nagaland, Dr Shurhozelie Liezietsu, while speaking at the 20th general conference of the Tenyimia People’s Organisation (TPO) at Senapati, Manipur on 31 October 2013 said that tribes of Tenyimia descended from Tenyiu, who was the eldest of four sons of Vadeo. Dr Shurhozelie states that ‘Tenyimia is a natural family institution and not a union. It would be in our interest to examine the identities of Tenyimia people to confirm and record the first dispersal place of Tenyimia at the legendary tree at Meikhel’. ⁹ The same piece carried a pivotal political assertion on Tenyimia identity which says,

If you get unemployed, if you are not able to sustain your living, your roots might be the only thing that will help you to keep up your identity. Secondly, the process of identification provides the ground for political allegiance in a political community. (Eastern Mirror 2013)

Tenyimia has the highest number of Naga tribes (ten tribes) under its ambit as compared to the ENPO and CNTC which will be discussed in the following sections. Political gain for NPF party for being favourable towards Tenyimia identity is beyond the state politics, since NPF is a political party both in Nagaland and Manipur. In 2012 and 2014 Neiphiu Rio ensued polling rallies and election campaigns in Manipur. In 2012 January, the then chief minister Neiphiu Rio urged the Nagas in Manipur to contest and use the platform provided by NPF to send their representatives to the Manipur Assembly elections. He appealed the Nagas to unite and campaigned for twelve candidates in five ¹⁰ districts of Manipur. Tenyemia traces its genealogy and socio-cultural jurisdiction to three states namely Nagaland, Manipur and Assam. ¹¹ In 2014 the regional party NPF expanded its politics to Northeast and joined North-East Regional Political Front (NERPF). ¹² On 18 May 2019, NPF joined the BJP led North-East Democratic alliance (NEDA). ¹³ Leading in number game and with the stable majority of Tenyemia, NPF is not threatened by the politics of CNTC which is an alliance of only three major Naga tribes, but it seeks not to undermine the ENPO which has six Naga tribes under its ambit.

Eastern Nagaland People’s Organisation: Exclusion Within the Resistance

This section considers the influence of collective memory and emotions tied to a group’s past history and its implications upon current conceptualisations of identity in contemporary Naga politics. The four administratively defined backward districts of Nagaland are Mon, Tuensang, ¹⁴ Longleng and Kiphere districts. All the four districts are located in Eastern Nagaland. ENPO constitutes six eastern Naga tribes namely, the Konyak, Phom, Sangtam, Yimchunger, Chang and Khiamniungan (The Morung Express 2011). Only six tribes are included under ENPO excluding the seventh tribe, Eastern Sumi Naga tribe who also inhabits the eastern districts of Kiphere and Tuensang districts (Ambrocia 2019). The demand for a separate state by Eastern Nagaland people’s movement is premised on the history of Neglect of the eastern Naga tribes in the past. Today the ENPO of six Naga tribes of eastern Nagas have made a conscious political choice to forget the history of 1998, where TMPO ¹⁵ participated and adopted a written constitution of Naga Hoho with the motto that Nagas are one (UNI 2019). While the Nagas have historically resisted against the Indian state, ENPO’s resistance and exclusion is directed inwards towards a separatist exit from the other Naga tribes and the state of Nagaland. ENPO claims that historically they were neglected by the ‘stronger Naga tribes’. ¹⁶ To resolve this crisis, the state Government implemented quota and reservation system in government jobs for the Backward tribes (BT as defined by the state). The contentious debates on reservation in the comment sections in Nagaland newspapers and Facebook blogs includes discussion on how other backward tribes in Nagaland are given 13% reservation, while the ENPO tribes enjoys 25% of government jobs for all categories (gazetted and non-gazetted posts) (The Morung Express 2011). Positive discrimination and reservation policy in Nagaland seems to be a symptomatic relief rather than a cure. In 2020 the ENPO have further intensified their demands and movement for a separate state. ¹⁷

On one hand, NPF’s politics of borderless identity has navigated its way beyond the cartography of Nagaland state, and has entered the state of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Manipur. On the other hand, the demand for a separate state by the ENPO is the current political impasse. NPF and ENPO’s ideology is oscillating towards opposite directions. In 2018 Nagaland Legislative Assembly election, out of the total of sixty Legislative Assembly seat, Eastern Nagaland was represented by twenty MLAs from the twenty Assembly constituencies of the eastern districts of Nagaland. Twenty seat represented by the ENPO entails ten Naga People’s Front (NPF), four Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), five Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP) and one National People’s Party (NPP). ¹⁸ It is observed here that NPF party ticket is obtained by the ENPO without sharing the political ideology of NPF. NPF has a firm foothold in Nagaland politics but the demand of a separate state by the ENPO cuts across party lines. ¹⁹

ENPO’s politics of exit has posed a grave challenge to Naga Nationalism. Naga Nationalists vision is threatened by ENPO’s demand of a separate state as it negates the NSCN-IM’s ideology and the geography of ‘Greater Nagalim’. The envisioned map of Greater Nagalim to integrate Naga inhabited areas from the four state of India: Nagaland, Manipur, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and also the Naga inhabited areas of Myanmar, is challenged by the demand of ENPO to cede out of this envisioned territory. The eastern Nagaland (ENPO) districts are Mon, Tuensang, Kiphire and Longleng districts which are geographically bordering Myanmar. The demand for a separate state by the ENPO has come in such times when NSCN-IM is trying to have its final negotiating with the Indian state. NSCN-IM has considered that the initial political settlement with the Government of India may not include Nagas in Myanmar, which would require India’s political settlement with Myanmar Government on the international borders (Singh 2020). A first generation Naga respondent from Dimapur said he is inclined towards NSCN-IM’s ideology. He said,

‘Greater Nagalim’ will unite all the Nagas under one map. This recognition will give justice to the Nagas which we have been waiting for years. ²⁰

Eastern Nagaland people’s sense of belonging drifts away from the idea of ‘greater Nagalim’. The emergence of ENPO identity wavers from a homogenous Naga identity, aspired to be bounded by one map. ENPO movement is a political identity that was produced along the geographies premised on the political economy of eastern Nagaland. Although the four districts of eastern Nagaland is inhabited by seven Naga tribes, ENPO lists only six Naga tribes excluding the eastern Sumi Naga tribes who inhabits Tuensang district and is a major tribe in Kiphere districts. While trying to understand the political economy of Nagaland, Sumi tribe is not a single unit even if it is just for analytical purpose. In Nagaland, western Sumi and central Sumi tribes are amongst the advanced major tribes of Nagaland, while the eastern Sumi geographically inhabits around the Saramati peak of Southeast Asia, a mountainous Nagaland borderlands with Myanmar. The eastern Sumi Nagas are listed under the administratively defined backward tribes of Nagaland. The Eastern Sumi Hoho (ESH) stated,

Since the time the region was un-administered area, and continued under the Tuensang Frontier Division of the then North Eastern Frontier Area (NEFA, 1945–56) administration, Naga Hills Tuensang Area (NHTA) (Tuensang district 1957–62), and under Tuensang district from the formation of Nagaland State in 1963 till date. As early as 1878, Sumi tribe established Phisami village followed by establishment of ten more Sumi villages namely, Thazuvi, Shothumi B, Lukhami, Nitoi, Honito, Nikiye, Kiyezhe, Xuvishe, Sukiur (Sumi Khel) and Ighoto. These 11 villages were established solely by Sumis (Nagaland Today Online 2019b). The utter shock to us is the exclusivity of the six tribes excluding the seventh tribe Sumis. The eastern Sumis along with other eastern tribes have been deprived of all the benefits and economic packages. The eastern Sumi tribe is deeply wounded by the Government recognition of ENPO without us. (Ambrocia 2019)

ENPO has forgotten the history of the eastern Sumi Naga tribe. Demand for ‘Frontier Nagaland’ and this misremembrance displaces and threatens the history and territory of the eastern Sumi Nagas. The eastern Sumi peoples are excluded but the proposed Map of frontier Nagaland includes the eastern Sumi’s ancestral Land and their inhabited territory. Thus the proposed geography of Frontier Nagaland constitutes portion of territory without its people: a map without its people. The map of a separate state includes the Sumi inhabited geographies of Kiphere and Tuensang districts. The exclusionary politics of the people and the inclusionary politics of the geographies in the proposed cartography of frontier Nagaland attempts to disentangle a group of people from their territory. The memory of ENPO suffers from partial amnesia referring to the ENPO’s selective memory on deprivation and marginalisation of the eastern Naga people, resulting in disengaging the eastern Sumi Nagas from their past and their geographies.

Central Nagaland Tribes Council: What Cannot be Forgotten

This section explores how collective identity is constructed in response to the politics of majority, political recognition and political representations. Memories of their rise to power post 1963 cannot be forgotten by the advanced tribes of Nagaland. Until the emergence of Tenyimia and ENPO politics in Nagaland, the Ao, Lotha, Angami and the Sumi (western and central) tribes overshadowed all the other tribes in socio-political and economic spheres. The headquarter districts of the Ao, Sumi ²¹ and Lotha’s are Mokokchung, Zunheboto and Wokha districts, respectively. Compared to other Naga tribes in Nagaland, these four tribes are advanced and constitutes the majority in urban areas like Dimapur and Kohima. Out of the four tribes, the CNTC comprises of the three erstwhile advanced tribes: Ao Naga, Sumi Naga and Lotha Naga. Angami Nagas leads the Tenyimia politics and are not a part of CNTC. On 8 December 2015, CNTC constituted the apex body of the three central tribes of Nagaland upon the principles of brotherhood, unity, solidarity and fraternity. Fifteen Interim council headed by Hokiye Yepthomi as Convenor of CNTC was set up (The Morung Express 2016). Rememberings of ‘brotherhood’ pervades the political rhetoric and speeches of the CNTC. Brotherhood is the foundational modalities upon which the inter-tribe alliance organisations in Naga society predominantly functions. In 2016, the President of Ao Senden ²² Imolemba Jamir, President of Lotha Hoho ²³ Mhao Humstoe and President of Sumi Hoho ²⁴ Toniho Yeptho, in their speeches appealed for trust, unity and brotherhood amongst the three major tribes. ²⁵ The past reshapes identities according to how the politics of brotherhood reinvents their present. CNTC notes that the formation of CNTC is an attempt for a separate political platform for Nagas of Nagaland, similar to the political platforms the Nagas in the neighbouring states have in their respective states (Nagaland Post 2019). CNTC enhances identity and borders demarcated by the modern state map. This need surfaced after organisations like Tenyimia and ENPO constructed a collective identity premised on cultural affinities and borderless identity beyond the territory of the state. Tenyimia and ENPO politics dismantled the erstwhile four advanced tribes. Today, the Tenyimia community has the largest share of ten Naga tribes across Nagaland, Manipur and Assam. ENPO has six tribes under its ambit from Eastern Nagaland. Remaining is the three central Nagaland tribes. Fear of becoming a minority in Naga politics compelled them to come together as ‘brothers’ under CNTC to counter the ‘new’ majoritarian politics in Nagaland especially post 1990s. Since 1963 and until the 1990’s the advanced tribes namely the Ao, Lotha, Angami and the Sumi had an unchallenged monopoly over political power, state’s resources and bureaucracy which is now being decentralised through quotas and reservation policy for the backward tribes in the state of Nagaland. Dismantling of advanced tribes began with the political construction of ENPO and Tenyimia identity culminating into majoritarian politics in Nagaland. On the contrary, the erstwhile advance tribes like the Aos, Sumis and the Lotha Nagas may perhaps be heading towards minority politics, unless the political trajectories change its course for the central Naga tribes in Naga politics. This mapping of political alliances along the geographies in Nagaland establishes the rememberings of who are their brothers and who are not their brothers in Naga politics. The formation of CNTC rests on the nostalgias and memories of their rise to power and the demise of their monopoly in Naga politics. Nostalgia over their progress, eminence and advancement, relives in their collective memory which they desire not to forget. CNCT symbolizes the desire for continuity of power and politics for the central Naga tribes.

Memory and Identity Politics: New Generations Digresses

The first section of the article dealt with generational study of the Nagas, particularly the remembering of the first and the second generation Nagas. Kansteiner (2014) argues that our sense of belonging to a particular generation affects our way of remembering the past. Generations can digress or reinvent identities and in that way, generation is a category or a collective that cuts across class, tribe, gender and religion (Kansteiner 2014, emphasis is mine). The first generation Nagas established their memory over the convergence of ‘one’ Naga identity during World Wars, colonial era and in their collective negotiations with the Indian state. The second generation Naga’s modern electoral politics of tribal political alliances, coalition politics, majoritarian politics and the politics of exit, along the lines of geographies, descent, culture and language, is in contradiction to the first generation Naga’s pride in one homogenous Naga identity and Naga Nationalism. Generational wavering and ideological shifts is more vivid in the state of Nagaland than other Naga inhabited areas. Today a recall of Naga Nationalism is not a remembrance of one political ideology because NSCN-IM is no longer the lone faction fighting for Naga Nationalism. Since India’s independence there has been gradual splits resulting in different factions, such as National Socialist Council of Nagaland, Isak-Muiva (NSCN-IM), NSCN-K (Khaplang), NSCN-U (Unification), ²⁶ NSCN-R (Reformation), ²⁷ and so on. These factions make the generational digression and ideological departures more viable.

Memory of the past authenticates one’s present identity and can perpetuate exclusive identities. It is important to understand why people remember certain things more than the other. This directly corresponds to the recollection of the past by the Nagas and how they situate themselves in certain political contexts (Griffin 2004, emphasis is mine). Halbwachs (1980) argued that collective memory and the past restricts and shapes our understanding while engaging our present politics, needs and power structures. Tenyimia, ENPO and CNTC political constructs reminds us of how memory is made and remade to serve the changing political interests of the ‘present’. As discussed in the previous sections, Naga Hoho is no longer the core stakeholders of Nagaland tribal Hoho. ENPO, NTC and CNTC have digressed from the ideologies of Naga Hoho. These organisations including the TPO represents the Nagas in political negotiations with the State, the Nationalists and the political parties for resolutions (Singh 2018) on socio-political matters concerning the Nagas.

Naga identity in relation to history, map, memory and identity is no more a homogenous category as envisioned by the first generation Nagas. It is neither time bound nor fixed. Naga identity assimilated and splintered at different historical times. Naga Hoho revived a borderless identity for the Nagas, whereas the NTC reinvented Naga identity bounded by space, time and geographies. Tenyimia identity is invoked by shared tradition, custom, culture, myths, stories, legends and bounded by language affinities. On the contrary, ENPO’s demand for a separate state moves towards the politics of exit. ENPO’s divergence from the idea of sovereignty and ‘Greater Nagalim’ is a resistance directed inwards rather than towards the Indian state. To undermine ENPO’s politics is to undermine the shaky ground Naga Nationalism stands upon today. The ideologies of Naga Nationalism which was once profound to the Nagas is no longer evocative to the masses at present times. While Tenyimia community evokes an inclusionary politics, the ENPO politics propagates an exclusionary ideology for the Nagas. Remembering and forgetting of the second generations Nagas in Nagaland questions the idea of one ‘Naga identity’. The second generation Nagas versions of the past as they remember it, is a digression from the rememberings of the first generation Nagas.

In this article, I investigated how the Nagas remember their past by remembering their present. It is not necessary that the authentic memory of the past frames the Naga politics today, but it is the present politics that appropriates the history of the Nagas. To the Nagas, the memory of colonial histography evokes a sense of abandonment by the British and the politics of disregard by the Indian State. The article through detailed sections explored how rememberings of brotherhood, clans, family, desires and neglects defines the geo-politics and the geo-body of the Naga society today. In all the cases analysed, both remembering and forgetting is political. The formulation of the Naga history today is a reconstruction of the past but in persisting dialogue with the present politics. An attempt of this article in mapping the memory of the Nagas was not intended to validate them into the category of right and wrong, but rather the mapped memories here are analysis of how the Nagas remembers their past in organising and reconstructing their identities which is familiar with their present politics. The Nagas in so many ways remember the present in their remembering of the past: the past that is viable to the present identity politics.