The lonely luxury of the rebel leader (1984)

The lonely luxury of the rebel leader
(TELEGRAPH: 1 July, 1984)

A curious feature of the lingering insurgency in the north-east is that while guerrillas suffer in their hideways, mostly tuck¬ed away in terrains, the lead¬ers live in self-exile and appa¬rent comfort in foreign coun¬tries. While the insurgents have chosen to stay away from their families, all their ack¬nowledged leaders are cooling their heels in alien soils with members of their families. Such differences in lifestyle have caused many upheavals in the ranks of the ethnic in¬surgents.


Where are the leaders now? What are they doing abroad lands? Piecing together an account of their present living standards, away from their struggling comrade-in-arms, and often without any feed¬back from the guerrilla thea¬ters, one gets a glimpse into a fascinating new element in the continuing drama of the troubled north-east.

Angami Zapu Phizo, who first kindled the fire of ethnic insurgency in this strategic re-gion in 1956, is now in Eng¬land. Belonging to the Gwizantus clan of the Angami Nagas and a product of the famous Khonoma village, Phizo steered the Nagas to the seces sionist path by organising a plebiscite on the issue of "in¬dependence" of Nagaland in 1951 and then forming the underground Naga Federal Government (NFG) on October 6, 1959. This rebel godfather, now aged 79, lives in a spa¬cious cottage in Bromley, Kent. His eldest daughter Adino and eldest son Kevilevor, a management graduate, stay with him. His Rengma-Naga wife Jwane, who lives alone in Phi-zo's house in Kohima, occa¬sionally receiving letters from her husband, letters which contain homilies and excerpts from the Bible.

For Phizo, it has been a long innings of self-exile. He escaped a well-laid security net in Nagaland in 1965 by crossing over to erstwhile East Pakistan, on his way to Eng-land.

Another rebel expatriate in England is Mizo National Front (MNF) president Laldenga. This 56-year-old architect of the Mizo chauvinism left the country in April 1982 after a six-year hibernation in south Delhi, during which time many an abortive discussion was held between him and Central leaders to usher in lasting peace in troubled Mizoram.

He now leads a cosy life in a Victorian cottage named Ven-ables House, at Constitutional Hill in Surrey. His wife Biakdiki and the children are his only companions in the house. His eldest son David is at Aizawl and his eldest daughter is a junior doctor in a Delhi hospit¬al. He maintains a feeble link with his 300-odd diehards in' Bangladesh sanctuaries through an MNF liaison cell in Dhaka.

Bejoy Hrangkhwl, the enigmatic leader of Tripura's secessionist tribal body Tripura National Volunteers (TNV), is now in Miani reserve forest in the Chittagong hills tract in Bangladesh with his wife Linda and two children. Hrankhal, who allegedly orga-nised the 1980 June massacre in Tripura, jumped bail in Au¬gust 1982 and slipped into neighbouring Chittagong Hills. While he is a enjoying the hospitality of his Bangladeshi mentors, his 100-odd tribal fol¬lowers are degenerating into bandits in the absence of the proper leadership.

T. Muivah, the general secretary of the pro-Beijing National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN), has also been in self-exile since 1973 in upper Burma, opposite Arunachal Pradesh, liaisoning with pro-Chinese Kachin insurgents and remote-controlling the moves of a hook-up between northeast's myriad rebel gangs. He is living with a Tangkhul Naga girl from east Manipur's Somdal village.

The new Ojha (messiah) of the Maoist People's Liberation Army (PLA) of Manipur, S. Temba Singh is also in upper Burma, leading an 80-member gang and enjoying the hospi¬tality of the firendly Nagas and Kachins there. Temba's Kuki wife Mary is also with him.
-Santanu Ghosh