Politics / Nagaland

DIMAPUR, Feb 27 – Nagaland Police chief reacting to the allegations levelled by various non-Congress political parties that personnel of both the recently raised Indian Reserve Battalions (IRB) had favoured ‘one’ political party, said the complaints have been enquired into through various sources and the report has been submitted to the government.

Terming the IRB personnel as the most disciplined and well trained to tackle any situation, Hesso Mao, Director General of Police, Nagaland vehemently denying the accusations said they had been properly briefed before being deployed for elections...

KOHIMA, Feb 26 — Unprecedented security blanket was thrown across Nagaland with deployment over 45,000 police, para-military and army personnel to ensure peaceful conduct of assembly election today amidst the shadow of large-scale intimidation and threats to voters, reports PTI. To pre-empt any untoward incident, the state government on Monday clamped night curfew in the entire state for two days and mobilised all resources for a free and fair poll despite reports of initimidation, threats and kidnapping of village elders being received by the CEO office at Kohima from various parts of the...

KOLKATA, Feb 26 – Seven persons, including five BSF personnel, were killed, three injured and a number of electronic voting machines were damaged in stray violence during polling for 60-member assemblies in the three northeastern states of Tripura, Nagaland and Meghalaya today, reports PTI. The turnout in Tripura was the highest – between 75 to 80 per cent, followed by 60 to 70 per cent in Nagaland and 55 per cent in Meghalaya. Taking into account the 50 per cent turnout in Himachal Pradesh the total turnout in the four states is 60 per cent, Election Commission sources said.

Five BSF...

NEW DELHI, Feb 25 — Personnel of Nagaland Armed Police (NAP) stormed the office of the Deputy Commissioner in Zunheboto district on the eve of elections as elaborate security arrangements were made today in Tripura, Meghalaya and Himachal Pradesh for tomorrow's Assembly polls, reports PTI.

About 100 men of the 8 NAP battalion stationed at Naltoga on the outskirts of the town gheraoed the DC's office last night on suspicion that their postal ballots for the polls were being tampered. They detained 20 staff members for about eight hours over the inadequate number of postal ballots by the...

KOHIMA, Feb. 24 – The Naga National Council, while ‘unreservedly’ condemning the forthcoming State Assembly elections called by the Government of India reasserted “in the strongest possible terms its rejection of any such elections in the absence of a settlement of the Naga political problem of invasion”.

The NNC in a release on Sunday issued by its acting president Gen. (retd) I. Panger Walling reminded the Government of India and the Naga people that “the imposition of the Indian state elections in the Naga country completely contravenes and countermands the Naga plebiscite of 1951”...

Dimapur, Feb. 22: Barely a week before the elections to the 10th Nagaland Assembly, the Congress is under intense pressure, especially in Dimapur district, from the Opposition that is hell-bent on denying another cakewalk to chief minister S.C. Jamir.

To counter the Opposition’s forages into the district, the Congress staged a protest rally against the alleged threats to its candidates and abduction of party workers and supporters by underground elements.

In a memorandum to Dimapur deputy commissioner Sanjay Kumar, the party openly alleged that “the NSCN (Isak-Muivah) is misleading the...

KOHIMA, Feb 22 — For the first time in Nagaland, women employees would be deployed as presiding and polling officers for the February 26 Assembly election, reports PTI.

Chief Electoral Officer Lalthara hoped that deployment of women officials for poll duty would check the practice of proxy voting in the state as they have been found more serious in their workplaces than their male counterpart in Nagaland. They would work in polling stations of urban areas like Kohima and Dimapur.

Although Naga women take leading role in both domestic chores and socio-cultural activities in the society, only...

Dimapur, Feb. 18: In a positive response to S.S. Khaplang’s call for unity, the NSCN (I-M) today said the rival insurgent leader’s statement could be the stimulus for a new campaign to reconcile warring Naga groups. “If we are all concerned about Naga unity, things should move in the right direction. In fact, our collective leadership had similarly appealed to all to give suggestions for the progress of the peace process,” the convener of the NSCN (I-M)’s ceasefire monitoring cell, Phungthing Shimrang, said here.

During a recent interview to The Telegraph at the NSCN (K)’s council...

Kohima, Feb. 17: The Church in Nagaland feels it is a bit too late to chalk out an action plan and enforce its “code of conduct” for electioneering. The Church, seeking to reform the poll process, had issued a set of guidelines for those in the political arena and as well as voters, expecting them to follow the rules for free and fair elections. However, with the elections drawing close, the Christian establishment feels the “people have not changed enough to see clean elections this time”. It finds itself helpless amid the aggressive campaigning.

The Nagaland Christian Forum, a consortium of...

Shillong, Feb. 13: Dismissing talk of the Centre isolating the Khaplang faction of the NSCN, the Union minister of state for home, I.D. Swami, today said the government had not lost sight of the fact that the outfit had as much a stake in Nagaland?s future as the Isak-Muivah group.

Swami told newspersons here that the Centre would hold talks with all insurgent outfits of the Northeast, provided they did not set any conditions. He said efforts were on to convince the NSCN (K) to opt for a dialogue and that the Centre had deputed secretaries in the home ministry to talk with S.S. Khaplang.

?Our...