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Northeast India’s political troubles can be traced to its economic underdevelopment. There is no guarantee that the Northeast’s present predicament can be solved by a successful counter-insurgency and a lot of money. This chapter argues that globalization presents opportunities for Northeast India to get out of the ‘territorial trap’ and relate to its transnational neighbours on the east, both economically and culturally. It discusses transnationalism and how transnational region building can bring important dividends to Northeast India in terms of economics and politics. It also describes the politics of recognition as a recurrent theme in the politics of ethnic militancy in the region, how China and security anxieties are holding back the region’s pursuit of a Look East policy, and the future direction of this policy.

This book explores the causes as well as the meaning and significance of political violence in Northeast India, focusing on the formal and informal structures of governance and the democracy deficit in the region. It looks at the life and times of the United Liberation Front of Assam(ULFA), the conflict between the Indian government and the Nagas, as well as the cultural politics that animate the militias of the region, and their relationship to their constituencies and to ‘mainstream’ social and political forces. In addressing the politics of militancy in Northeast India, the book focuses on areas both inside and outside the borders of what is called Assam today. Instead of reinforcing a false separation between ‘insurgency’ and the ‘mainstream’ of social and political life, the book argues that ethnic militias, counter-insurgency operations, state-backed militias, developmentalist practices, and the deformed institutions of democratic governance constitute a coherent whole, known as durable disorder.

Arunachal Pradesh, part of the eastern Himalayas, boasts pristine forests and intact mega-biodiversity. With a fragile mountain ecosystem, the state is an ideal candidate for sustainable development. This chapter examines how the discourse of development has emerged in Arunachal, and argues that the goal of nationalizing a frontier space has been the major thrust of Indian policy vis-à-vis Northeast India in general and Arunachal in particular. It explores the way in which this national security driven process, following the 1962 border war between India and China, has resulted in the creation of a special regional dispensation of small and financially dependent states that, in a formal sense, are autonomous in terms of India’s federal polity. However, in terms of power vis-à-vis the central government, this form of federalism is little more than cosmetic. The chapter contends that, in the attempt to nationalize this space, the logic of developmentalism is no doubt embedded in state institutions but at significant social, environmental, and political costs.

This chapter first defines the problem with the existing research on the region, which treats the Northeast region as a single unit. It then summarizes the history of conflicts in the region and in the two states—Manipur and Mizoram. It covers the specific literature on conflicts in Northeast India and the adequacy of existing arguments for understanding specific questions. It also reviews the literature on state building and collapse and examines some recent approaches to studying issues of state capability that provide promising ways to engage with the research problem. The chapter argues that the breakdown in Manipur is as much about the mobilization against the agencies of the state as it is about intercommunity conflicts. Social control in Manipur stands fragmented and state actors have failed to become the dominant force in society.

The development of connectivity infrastructure between India and ASEAN through Northeast India has been presented as a way forward for Northeast India to address its current state of underdevelopment. New Delhi increasingly presents the development of the region as integral to its efforts towards greater integration with its eastern neighbours under the aegis of its Look East Policy. Some of the internal and external strategic compulsions that prevented the region from being opened up[ continue to persist. There are greater development challenges within the region if it were to benefit from opening up and integration with Southeast Asia. Further, if the region is to meaningfully become part of a new economic dynamism, there is a need to reconsider the current limited context within which New Delhi seeks to open it out. This requires addressing difficult issues with neighbors with whom India has not always had cordial relations.

When India became independent from British rule in 1947, it faced a major constitutional problem with respect to Manipur and other indirectly ruled ‘native states’. Indeed, the decision of the Kashmiri Maharaja to accede to India was responsible for the eruption of the Kashmir conflict between India and Pakistan. Manipur’s merger with India is considered illegal and unconstitutional by a number of militias today. Like other states in the Indian Union, Manipur has an elected chief minister and an elected state legislature. However, it also has a de facto parallel structure of governance directly controlled from Delhi that manages counter-insurgency operations. Aside from Manipur, four other states of Northeast India today have militias of varying levels of activity and intensity. In an attempt to control this reality, the central government has been appointing retired generals as governors to monitor the dilution of civil political authority in the Northeast.

In Meghalaya as well as in the states of Mizoram, Nagaland, and Arunachal Pradesh, non-tribals are considered denizens. This protective discrimination regime dates back to colonial times when policy instruments were used to protect vulnerable aboriginal peoples living in isolated enclaves. In recent years, Northeast India has witnessed internal displacements caused by violent ethno-national conflicts. This chapter describes an unfolding crisis of citizenship resulting from the tension between the politics of ethnic homelands and the logic of the political economy of Northeast India. It examines the historical conditions and institutional context in which some of the typical ethno-political conflicts of the region take place, and why these conflicts have triggered episodes of ethnic violence and internal displacement. The author concludes by discussing how erstwhile ethnic subjects can become full fledged citizens, and how the descendents of immigrants should not have to remain as perpetual ‘outsiders’ in Assam. Dual citizenship could be one answer.

It is argued that India’s approach to its Northeast.and towards the BCIM-EC initiative is not practically grounded. The failure of Look East Policy in bringing development to the Northeast amply proves that Northeast is yet to be provided with a viable and economically complementary partner to interact with. In any logical analysis, China is only such suitable economic partner for Northeast India. An attempt is made to look at the India’s economic fears in opening out Northeast to the Chinese and specific concerns of India regarding engaging China, Myanmar and Bangladesh are also discussed. They are not necessarily economic. Considering the Sino-Indian strategic juxtaposition, India’s real and perceived apprehensions, and the prospects of BCIM-EC for the Northeast, an argument is made for graduated engagement. It makes a case for sector specific opening of India’s Northeast to Chinese investment.

This chapter compares the account of the variance in conflict and political order to that provided in the literature on Northeast India and specifically in the conflict literature. The author describes the theoretical and policy implications of his research. It discusses that state agencies face challenges from rival forces across the range of their functions and that the ruling coalition in Mizoram has been able to mitigate inter-group contestations and prevent conflicts from breaking out uncontainably. It notes that grievance is an important ingredient for conflicts and violence. A comparison between the political economy of Manipur and Mizoram shows that both institutional arrangements and capabilities of the state in Manipur are poor, and hence, prone to internal and external shocks. It concludes by suggesting that actions around local issues, particularly those that are about inclusionary participation mechanisms, such as through public action for provision of public services will need to be pursued.

Most of the research on the prehistoric archaeology of the Northeast shows that many such research attempts are confined mainly to surface sites, and that excavated sites from the Neolithic and even the historical period are comparatively rare. It is now time to scrutinize the nature of the studies done so far on Northeast Indian archaeology and assess the historiography, together with the recent theoretical developments in the discipline. The area is a contact zone between the East and the West and will only be fully known when a complete picture emerges of its prehistoric cultural growth through sustained archaeological and interdisciplinary palaeoecological research. This chapter spells out the rationale behind the research, the problem, the working hypotheses, aim, objectives, and methodologies followed in the book.

For nearly 50 years, India’s northeast region was known for assertions of ethnic independence of numerous communities and the scale of violent anti-India insurgencies. In the past two decades, however, ceasefires and peace talks have taken hold and replaced armed conflicts for the most part. Yet, social tensions remain high in several parts, with outbursts of sectarian and ethnic violence. As the current government embarks on an ambitious programme of infrastructure development across the region, several political uncertainties have cropped up, which could impact internal stability in the northeast and affect India’s ability to influence its eastern neighbours. The chapter is divided into two broad sections: the first briefly examines the political and economic linkages of the region, including the armed challenges to India. The second addresses contemporary issues of governance, growth, and stability while making a set of specific and overarching recommendations for policy change.

Longkumer offers a preliminary examination of how the BJP has been able to negotiate its status in the region. Based on ethnographic data and media reports, Longkumer argues that the BJP honed a self-sufficient and dynamically structured political machine and adopted an agenda that transcended religious, social and cultural boundaries. Longkumer focuses on two aspects of the BJP’s approach: its utilization of key alliances that have emerged in reaction to the failures of regional and central governments, and its projection of itself as a secular party that encompasses, but also moves beyond, exclusively ‘Hindu’ sentiments. The chapter highlights this ‘double-think’ – the situational/ regional differences in political self-presentation that demonstrate the malleability of Hindu nationalist ideology, while at the same time managing the BJP’s complex relationship with the RSS.

Since 1947 when India gained independence from British rule, the government has been engaged in a bloody armed conflict with the leading political organization fighting for Naga independence. In 1963, the Indian government created the state of Nagaland whose territory coincided with what was then the centrally administered Naga Hills Tuensang Area. Despite efforts to end the conflict, the line between the independentist and the integrationist factions in Naga politics have remained blurred. The author looks at the Naga independentist movement in the context of its opposition to federal constructionism of Naga identity. He also discusses the pamphlet Bedrock of Naga Society (2000) in which the state Congress party takes on the independentist argument that the formation of the Nagaland compromised the sovereignty of the Nagas. The chapter also explores the dynamic between the hill peoples and the lowland states in pre-colonial times and focuses on the relation between the Nagas and the Manipuris which presents the greatest challenge to the peace process today.

Chakraborty and Ray discuss the ‘land question’ by critically examining the appropriation of community land and subsequent dispossession of the tribes embedded in the social economy of the hills of Northeast India. They state that the historico-epistemological hiatus between the customary law abiding tribes vis-à-vis the positive law imposing state appears to be fundamental in understanding the difference between the two contrasting interpretations of property rights enacted in the highlands of the region. The trivialization of community land and dispossession of the tribal masses in Manipur, Meghalaya, and Tripura suggests that constitutional protections have fallen short in protecting the community resources of the tribes. The hydropower projects in Arunachal Pradesh and the threats of dispossession of the communities under the hegemony of state-business collusion represent the continuing process of appropriation of the community resources in the hill areas.

India and China have more in common in terms of economic development challenges and issues of administration and management than is usually acknowledged. It also needs to be noted that increasingly, it is the Indian states and Chinese provinces that have the responsibility to address these challenges becoming, in the process, extremely dynamic actors in their own right both domestically and externally. This chapter examines the role of Chinese provinces in the country’s growth story and draws out lessons for India and its states and suggests that from a foreign policy perspective, economic exchanges at the sub-national level as well as sub-regional transnational groupings also allow for experimentation in various methods of cooperation between India and China.