Encouraged by the response from the people, the Eastern Nagaland People's Organisation (ENPO), which is demanding a separate State to be carved out of Nagaland, is organising simultaneous public demonstrations in four districts of Nagaland and the Naga-inhabited areas in Arunachal Pradesh on January 7.
The ENPO had already submitted memoranda to the Prime Minister and the Union Home Minister demanding that the new state proposed be named “Frontier Nagaland.”
The demonstrations will be held at Mon, Tuensang, Kiphire and Longleng districts of Nagaland. Besides a demonstration will be organised in Tirap district of Arunachal Pradesh where there is a considerable population of the three Naga tribes, the
Konyak, the Nokte and the Wancho.
The ENPO said there were no developmental works in these districts of Nagaland. The six Naga tribes in the four districts have been demanding 25 per cent job reservation in the Nagaland government offices. The government has been turning a deaf ear to these demands, the ENPO leaders said. They would continue the agitations till the demands were met.
The National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah), which had signed a ceasefire with the Indian government on June 25, 1997, has been holding talks with the unification of the “Naga-inhabited areas” of the North East with Nagaland on top of the agenda. However, there has not been much progress since the other States object to it. On December 14, Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram said that there should be no redrawing of the boundary of Manipur.
Manipur Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh had told the Assembly that the government would not tolerate any demand for a separate State or arrangement.
