All Naga Political Groups, from different backgrounds and ideologies, have unequivocally and unanimously declared one historical truth: There is no Kuki land in Naga territory.
This is not a new claim. This is not an emotional outburst. This is the historical, ancestral, and cartographic truth that the Nagas have defended with blood and with tears.
Yet today, the Naga people face an aggression that is not merely physical but post-modern, complex, and multi-layered — a war where narrative is weapon, demography is weapon, illegal immigration is weapon, and transnational networks are weapon. The adversary has understood that you do not need to defeat Nagas with guns alone; you can defeat them by planting villages in their hills, by multiplying on their map, and by making the world believe that their ancestral land is disputed.
This is the complexity of the aggression Nagas face today from Kuki expansionism, and it must not be treated lightly.
NRC — The only lawful, moral surgery
If there is one instrument that can bring truth back to Manipur, it is the National Register of Citizens – NRC.
NRC is not against any community. NRC is for truth. NRC is for law. NRC is for all genuine stakeholders — Nagas and Meiteis, who are the indigenous peoples of Manipur.
The logic is brilliantly simple and morally unassailable:
If Kuki groups and their supporters claim that there are no illegal immigrants, no foreign terrorists and no illegal villages in Manipur, then they should be the first to welcome and support NRC. Why fear a register if you are legal?
To oppose NRC while claiming legality is the greatest self-contradiction. Truth does not fear verification. Only falsehood fears a register.
For Manipur, NRC will help clean all illegal immigrants, terrorists and their illegally established villages. This is good for all genuine stakeholders. It is good for Nagas. It is good for Meiteis. It is good for the future of India. It is even good for genuine and legal Kuki citizens who do not want their names to be tainted by illegality.
Nagas have no option left. The existing system and status quo of Manipur has completely collapsed. The State mechanism has failed to protect Nagas ancestral domain. Delimitation is frozen, Census is doubtful, land records are manipulated, and unverified villages have mushroomed in Naga territory while Naga MLAs are told to be silent.
In this existential crisis, Nagas must use NRC as a lawful, constitutional, and non-violent weapon to nail all terrorists, illegal immigrants, and their illegal villages.
NRC is not politics. NRC is survival.
Why slogans and condemnations are harmful
This is the most painful truth Nagas must hear today.
Slogan alone will not save Nagas. Celebration alone will not save Nagas. Press statement and condemnation letter alone will do more harm than good if they are not backed by capability and capacity.
The world does not respect a people who only know how to shout slogans. The world respects a people who have capacity.
What do Nagas need? Nagas need strong Revolutionists.
A Revolutionist is not a man with a gun alone. A Revolutionist is a new breed of Naga leaders:
1. Intellectual Revolutionist: Who can argue Naga history, Naga land, and Nagas’ political rights in Delhi, in the Supreme Court, in Geneva, with maps, with documents, with data, not with emotions.
2. Legal and Constitutional Revolutionist: Who can file cases, who can demand NRC, who can protect Naga land through law, who can use Delimitation and Census as weapons for Nagas’ survival.
3. Social and Organizational Revolutionist: Who can unite Naga villages, who can build early warning systems, who can build economic self-reliance, so that no non-Nagas can undermine the Nagas constitutionally and administratively in Manipur.
4. Moral and Spiritual Revolutionist: Who cannot be bought with contract work, cabinet post, or personal benefit. Who will not settle peace for his own contract and his own chair at the cost of Nagas shared security.
Without such Revolutionists, no nation will take Nagas political issue seriously. Without capacity, any negotiation by Naga leadership with any nation — be it GOI or anyone — will be seen as begging, not bargaining.
Even in Manipur, as long as Nagas remain weak and divided, non-Nagas will continue to undermine Nagas constitutionally, administratively, financially, and territorially.
We must ask vehemently: How long will Nagas survive on memories of past glory while their present capacity is hollow?
The dangerous illusion
Declaring national highways to travel freely is not the solution in Manipur.
Giving 2 or 3 more MLA seats to Nagas and Kukis with promises of development in Naga Districts is not the solution.
These are cosmetic bandages on a cancerous wound. A highway through your land is meaningless if your land itself is no longer yours. An extra MLA seat is meaningless if that MLA is told by the Chief Minister’s Office to remain silent and he obeys.
Nagas must open themselves for open discussion and consultation for their safety. There is a right time for peace negotiation in Manipur, but that time must not come at the cost of collective security.
Here is the critical warning to all Naga leaders, especially Naga MLAs and negotiators in Manipur:
“Please don’t settle peace for your own contract work, your own benefit, and your own cabinet post at the cost of the Nagas shared security in Manipur. It must be for collective security or greater constitutional status in order to strengthen Nagahood.”
Any peace that is settled for personal gain is not peace. It is treason. Any agreement that does not guarantee greater constitutional protection for Nagas ancestral domain, that does not guarantee NRC, that does not guarantee protection of Nagas land from illegal villages, that does not guarantee institutional safety — is not an agreement. It is surrender.
The Naga people in Manipur are facing existential threat. Their land is being encroached, their voices are being silenced, their history is being distorted. In such a time, cheap peace is more dangerous than open war.
Gravity of KUKI politics
The Naga people are a peace-loving people. They have prayed for peace in Manipur. But peace without truth is not peace.
The rising Kuki politics for homeland with demand for Union Territory, supported by transnational networks, illegal immigration, and armed groups, is a complex post-modern aggression against both the Nagas and the Meiteis, the indigenous peoples.
This must not be treated lightly with mere condemnation statements. Condemnation without capacity invites more aggression.
If Nagas condemn today and do nothing tomorrow to build capacity, the adversary learns one lesson: Nagas only know how to condemn.
Therefore, Nagas must build strong, united, disciplined, and capable institutions:
– A Pan-Naga documentation cell to map every ancestral village
– A legal cell to pursue NRC, Census, and Delimitation in courts
– A youth cell of Revolutionists who are trained intellectually, morally, and organizationally
– A unified voice from Ukhrul to Senapati, from Tamenglong to Chandel, from Nagaland to Manipur
Slogan says “Nagas are one.” Capacity proves it.
The choice before Nagas
Biblically, Nehemiah did not rebuild Jerusalem with slogans. He rebuilt it with a sword in one hand and a trowel in the other — capacity and work. “From that day on, half of my men did the work, while the other half were equipped with spears, shields, bows and armor.” — Nehemiah 4:16
Morally, a people who cannot protect their land will lose their God-given inheritance. The Lord gave land to each tribe for a reason.
Politically, logically, and lawfully, NRC is the most powerful, non-violent, constitutional tool Nagas have today. Support it. Demand it. Implement it.
And above all, Nagas must produce strong Revolutionists — not contractors in the name of leaders, not silent spectators in the name of MLAs.
For if Nagas fail to build capacity and capability unitedly now, no one — neither GOI nor GOM nor any international body — will treat Nagas political issue seriously.
If not us, who will save Nagas in Manipur?
If not strong Revolutionists, who will make non-Nagas respect Nagas?
And if not now, when will we ever rise from slogans to strength?
For the Naga People. For Ancestral Land. For NRC. For True Peace With Collective Security. For a Future Built by Revolutionists, Not Contractors.
***
Michael Meiphami Shaiza is Co-incharge of BJP Manipur State Political Programmes and Meetings and President of Ukhrul-based NGO Ecological Rehabilitators’ Association (ERA).
(Views expressed are writers’ own and do not, in whatsoever manner, reflect that of Ukhrul Now)
