Chozuba (Phek), June 8: A sub-inspector in the Border Security Force (BSF)’s Nagaland-based 111 Battalion, Ahoto has five years of service left. But he is already 75, which means he will be 80 by the time he calls it a day. Four of his friends, all of them based at the Satakha battalion headquarters in Zunheboto, are in their seventies and will retire around the same time. These men were members of what the BSF describes as the “Naga Revolutionary Army” and were inducted into the paramilitary force in 1973.
Explaining why such elderly people had been retained, BSF commandant Man Singh said:...