Demonstrating State Memory - Institute for South …southasia.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/shared/...Demonstrating State Memory The Politics of Tribe and Counterinsurgency in Mizoram

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Demonstrating State Memory

The Politics of Tribe and Counterinsurgency in Mizoram and Chhattisgarh Vasundhara Sirnate University of California, Berkeley

+INSURGENCY DEFINED…

“An organized movement aimed at the overthrow of a constituted government through the use of subversion and armed conflict”.

US Army, COIN Manual

Counterinsurgency in India Vasundhara Sirnate

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+COIN personnel speak…

Chhattisgarh

  “They eat grass…Tribes have no medicines. Their average survival age is 40 years at the maximum. They still go to local “jhad-pooch” wallahs (witch doctors).”

  “How will they handle things on their own?”

(signalling primitivity)

Mizoram

“We could never have won against the Mizos, we can never win against the Nagas. They are too well disciplined. Like an army.”

“They have their own institutions, justice systems, people believe in them.”


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+Pacting in Mizoram and Chhattisgarh?

Chhattisgarh

  “May not work”

  “How can you pact with these people?”

  “Out of the question”

  “Need to be kept in line”

Mizoram

  “Good warriors”

  “They know how to negotiate”

  “Well organized”

  “What else can you do, fighting with them is tough”

  “They already have local parliaments.”


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+Countering Insurgency

  Why does the Indian state pursue different counterinsurgency strategies in different regions of India?

  Use heavy coercion (Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir)

  Pact with insurgents (Tripura, Mizoram, Nagaland)

  Sub-contract force to private militias (Chhattisgarh)


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+Research Design

•  Qualitative, two years, deep-tissue fieldwork.

•  120 interviews, snowball sample.

•  Extensive interviews with counterinsurgency personnel

•  Paired comparisons, comparative historical analysis

•  Lok Sabha debates, Constituent Assembly Debates, NDC dissertations, Census from 1891, anthropological works on tribes.

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+Research Design- II

•  Data collection from Asian Recorder and the Asian News Digest (1955-2008). Currently doing this from The Hindu newspaper.

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1955

1956

1957

1958

1962

1963

1965

1966

1967

1968

1969

1970

1972

1973

1974

1975

1978

1979

1981

1982

1983

1984

1985

1987

1988

1989

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

0

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Attacks and Deaths By YearTotal Killed

Security Killed

Attacks1009

Kill

ed b

y In

surg

ents

K

illed

by

Insu

rgen

ts

Att

acks

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10

11

12

13

14

15

16

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+Countering Insurgency

  Why does the Indian state pursue different counterinsurgency strategies in different regions of India?

  Use heavy coercion (Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir)

  Pact with insurgents (Tripura, Mizoram, Nagaland)

  Sub-contract force to private militias (Chhattisgarh)


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+Explaining variation

  State-memory

  Location of state (border or not)


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+State Memory

Perception of groups by the state maintained over time. “beliefs, perceptions, histories and ideas about groups”

“territory” (how has a group been located geographically over time, Eg. “frontier” tribesmen)

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+Demonstrating State Memory

Do tribes located in different geographical regions receive different political treatment?

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+‘Ungovernable’ Tribes

  Idea of ‘primitivity’ allows for legislations like the Criminal Tribes Act.

  127 ‘communities’ notified. (across India and Pakistan).


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+Perceiving ‘Tribe’

  State ‘identifies’ tribes (groups located in inaccessible areas, nomadic)

  Tribe as a residual category in the Census.

  Anthropologists see tribe as a concept in opposition to ‘civilization’.

  Tribes are in an intermediate state of civilization.

  Primitive, inferior, lacking skills or alternatively ‘noble savages’.


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“People from time immemorial have been pursuing the caste system defined job-positions: weaving, carpentry and such were hereditary jobs. So there must have been hereditary criminals also who pursued their forefathers’ profession…”

- James Fitzjames Stephen


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+Tribes in India

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+But not all tribes are thought of as primitive


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+How do we know this?

  Two Constitutional Schedules – the Fifth and Sixth


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+Sixth Schedule

  Provides for Autonomous District Councils

  Highest expression of tribal sovereignty

  Has allowed many groups to scale down their demands

  Mostly for northeastern states (save Manipur)


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+Fifth Schedule

  Allows for only a Tribes Advisory Council (no territorial powers given)

  Applicable to central India (and Manipur)


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+Counterinsurgency in Mizoram

  Operation Jericho in 1966 by the Mizo National Front

  Political negotiations on the cards almost immediately after

  Pact in 1987 with the center.


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+Counterinsurgency in Chhattisgarh against Maoists

  Predominantly based on force

  Subcontracted force to the Salwa Judum (purification hunt)

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+Case 2: Chhattisgarh

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+ Brigadier Ponwar Counterinsurgency and Jungle Warfare college

+Theoretical contributions of project

  State memory affects political treatment

  Insurgent group contagion

  States function in competitive institutional environments, generated by‘credible rivals’ (different from threats).


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Documents

Demonstrating State Memory - Institute for South …southasia.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/shared/...Demonstrating State Memory The Politics of Tribe and Counterinsurgency in Mizoram