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Sanjoy Hazarika has written a blog post on the potential for the frequent bandhs (strikes) in northeast India to hamper northeast India-ASEAN connectivity, a concept loudly spruiked by the Indian government.
This is a good point, and one I have not seen made before. It is consistent with the view of many scholars of the northeast, that while such connectivity may be desirable, it is far from a panacea for the northeast's woes. India needs to address serious issues of law and order and governance in the northeast, and refrain from putting all its eggs in the economic development basket.
Hazarika also stresses the importance of environmentally-conscious development, given the potential for the northeast to benefit from tourism.
The Diplomat this week published an article on links between Chinese intelligence services and northeast Indian rebel groups, particularly the NSCN(IM). It has been alleged that agents of Chinese intelligence services have done arms deals with the NSCN(IM) and that the NSCN(IM) has established a permanent presence in Kunming, Yunnan Province. The Kunming representative acts as broker and passes on information about Indian armed forces activities in Arunachal Pradesh, a state China claims as its own.
The comments on the article make for interesting reading as well.
The Diplomat article draws heavily on an earlier article published in Outlook India.
The Telegraph reported on Monday that an 800-strong unit of the Combat Battalion for Resolute Action (CoBRA) has been stationed in Guwahati ahead of the state elections and in response to increased violence by ULFA and the NDFB. CoBRA is a Central Reserve Police Force special force, specialising in guerrilla warfare.
Following the Congress Party's chairman's comments that both the BJP and Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) parties have links with ULFA, the AGP's President has accused the Congress Party of complicity in ULFA's actions.
The AGP and BJP appear to be cooperating to a degree. The AGP yesterday announced it would not field a candidate in the seat of BJP Assam president Ranjit Dutta and signalled openness to post-poll cooperation. Meanwhile ULFA's pro-talks faction has announced it will remain neutral in the lead up to the April 4 and 11 elections.
A Canadian documentary that recently aired in Australia called Raw Opium devoted considerable attention to poppy cultivation in Arunachal Pradesh.
The Times of India has reported on a bomb blast last night at the Congress Party's headquarters in Assam. United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) elements against the current peace talks have claimed responsibility. No one was killed but at least four people were injured.
Update (18/3): three ULFA cadres have been arrested in relation to the blast and an operation has been launched to capture its alleged mastermind.
In the latest in a series of announcements about improving Indo-Bangladeshi rail connectivity, The Daily Star reports on an announcement that the Indian and Bangladeshi governments will cooperate to build a railway track between Agartala (Tripura) and Akhaura (Chittagong division). This will allow goods from throughout northeast India to reach Chittagong port.
A 2007 US Government cable reporting on a meeting between a US diplomat and an Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) official reports on the progress of cooperation between the Bangladesh rifles and the Border Security Forces.
There is also mention of rumoured Indian government military support to the Burmese junta in exchange for Burmese cooperation on Indian insurgent groups in their territory. The MEA official states that the Indo-Burma relationship has been reduced to cooperation on northeast Indian insurgent groups alone, with India failing to win much-prized natural resources contracts in that country.
In an April 2006 briefing cable ahead of a US-India counter terrorism (CT) joint working group meeting a US government official notes that "terrorism" in the northeast "attracts little attention from Delhi". The cable states that the Government of India is preoccupied with jihadi terrorism originating in Kashmir and Pakistan and relatively disinterested in violence due to the maoist and northeast movements. The official speculates on the reasons for this GoI prioritisation, including that jihadi violence is not restricted to rural areas and the government's view that solutions to insurgencies in the maoist belt and the northeast are likely to be reached by improving local governance and economic opportunities.
The Diplomat this week ran an opinion piece attempting to draw lessons from current events in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya for India.
I have a number of issues with this article. For one, it all but neglects surely the most serious internal threat for India in 2011: the raging Maoist movement.
Secondly, it trumpets the ability of democracy to nullify "the edge" of insurgencies. Some of the most respected scholars on the northeast (such as Sanjib Baruah in his 2005 book Durable Disorder) have persuasively argued that, although there are performances of democracy in the form of local governments in the northeast, it is the parallel autocratic system of governance, allowed by the AFSPA and executed by the centrally-appointed governors, that is dominant in the region. The article suggests that is is India's vibrant democracy that has brought ULFA to the negotiating table. The informed consensus is that it has more to do with a friendly government in Dhaka cracking down on insurgent bases in its borderlands. Moreover there is a long way to go before a victory can be claimed of the current ULFA talks.
Finally, the links to the current political upheaval in the Arab world are tenuous. What the overthrow of a 40 year autocracy in Egypt in a manner of weeks has to do with 50 years of attrition in Manipur and elsewhere in the northeast is unclear.
Another article this week that used the 'Jasmine revolution' as a starting point to assess the state of affairs of South Asian conflicts is to be found in the South Asia Intelligence Review (SAIR). This more factually-based account points to the Maoist insurgency as the exception to a general improvement in the region's conflicts in the last couple of years, including in the northeast.
