Kohima: Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said on Wednesday that his party is making all-out efforts to unite the country, while the BJP is busy with “artificial uniformity”.
Ramesh, who was on a two-day campaign trail in support of the Congress candidate for the lone Lok Sabha seat in Nagaland, S. Supongmeren Jamir, alleged that the BJP government at the Centre signed different agreements with the Naga groups without making any substantial progress towards a permanent solution to the Naga political issue.
In 2015, the Centre signed the ‘Framework Agreement’ with the NSCN-IM, but the details of the pact were never revealed to the public, Ramesh claimed.
In 2017, the Central government signed the ‘Agreed Position’ with the working committee of the Naga National Political Groups (NNPGs), but no action has been taken since the agreement was inked, the Congress leader told the media.
Ramesh also said that in 2023, the Eastern Nagaland People’s Organisation announced that it would abstain from the Assembly elections unless Eastern Nagaland was granted autonomy.
The abstention was lifted after the Union Home Ministry agreed to meet their demands, Ramesh said, adding that a year later, the ENPO has been left hanging, and is now calling upon the people to boycott the Lok Sabha elections.
“The BJP government only makes grand announcements, which are followed by zero action. It only cares about headline management. The so-called double-engine government in Nagaland is a joke. What the state needs is a permanent solution to its political issue, and that’s what the Congress has committed in its Nyay Patra,” Ramesh said.
The Congress leader also claimed that in November last year, talks between the government and the NSCN-IM broke down.
Ramesh also said that Article 371 (A) was inserted in the Constitution in 1963 when Nagaland was formed, and the special provision aimed at safeguarding the traditional cultures and customs of Nagaland, which is under threat now.
The Congress Rajya Sabha MP also said that the neighbouring Manipur has been burning for the past 11 months, as he expressed fear that similar tensions can spread to the other northeastern states as well.
–IANS