Opinion: Secession and Karachi link - Why Indira Gandhi got IAF to bomb Mizoram in 1966

“The national interest cannot be defined as a common interest of the industrial, commercial, and financial companies of a country, because there is no such common interest; nor can it be defined as the life, liberty, and well-being of the citizens, because they are continually being adjured to sacrifice their well-being, their liberty, and their lives to the national interest.” - Simone Weil

Thousands of miles away from Europe — the social and intellectual laboratory of French philosopher Weil — national interest was also at the centre of a conflict that would draw Indira Gandhi into the turbulent region of Mizoram. Indira Gandhi had just taken over as the prime minister in January 1966 when, in March that year, she had to ask the Indian Air Force to bomb a part of Aizawl, and areas that form a part of the present-day Mizoram state.

The context and commentary of that era becomes necessary and relevant following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s no-holds-barred attack on the Congress. While responding to the no-trust motion in the Lok Sabha, PM Modi made a reference to Mizoram, pointing at how on March 5, 1966, the Indian Air Force was made to bomb citizens of Mizoram.

“Congress should answer, were the people of Mizoram not the citizens of my country? Was it not the Indian Air Force? Even today, the people of Mizoram mourn the day on every March 5. Congress has hidden this from the country. Who was the PM then? It was Indira Gandhi," Modi told the Lok Sabha when the entire Opposition, i.e. the INDIA alliance, had staged a walkout.

A closer scrutiny of events happening in Mizoram, then part of greater Assam, tells a somewhat different story that explains how a strong sense of duty and national interest had prompted an inexperienced prime minister to act swiftly and rather decisively.

On March 1, 1966, Laldenga, a former havildar in the Indian army, had turned a full-time secessionist, insurgent, fugitive across the border, receiving an unaccounted number of arms and funds from China and Pakistan.

On March 1, 1966, Laldenga had declared “independence” from the Indian Union to establish an independent Mizo nation called “Greater Mizoram”. Laldenga, it may be noted, lived in Karachi with full protection and support from the Pakistani military junta.

Things became worse when the MNF “dagger brigade” began to assassinate former party leaders who had surrendered. Laldenga, from Karachi, had issued a notice to non-Mizos to leave the state or face death.

Interestingly, the fall of Dhaka and the creation of the Bangladesh state deftly engineered by Indira Gandhi made a pragmatic Laldenga to sense that the army junta in Pakistan was not strong enough to help his cause. Laldenga started sending several feelers to the Indian government, seeking an honourable position for himself in any future set up.

S Hasanwalia, a senior Research and Analysis Wing [RAW] officer, is said to have met Laldenga in Zurich in 1975, where peace talks began. From then on, the peace bandwagon moved to a neat course, culminating in the historic peace accord in 1987.

In fact, Laldenga’s extraordinary life reads like an adventure novel, but nothing captures his legacy better than the sobriquet he has been bestowed with — “Father of the Mizo Nation.” The word nation itself says and implies a lot. At one point, Laldenga used to say one sentence with great relish and punch, “In the house of India, there lives an unhappy man. His name is Mizo.”

While Mizoram thankfully never became a separate nation, Laldenga did ensure a distinct identity for his land — that of a full-fledged state. He signed a peace accord with Rajiv Gandhi to become chief minister of Mizoram that led to an uninterrupted era of peace and tranquillity from February 20, 1987 till date.

He owes something to Rajiv Gandhi on that account. In Rajiv, Laldenga found a man who understood him and Mizo aspirations. Rajiv, who was eager to resolve endemic problems in several states, met Laldenga on February 15, 1985.

Laldenga, who had arrived from London, demanded concessions relating to tribal laws and customs and trading rights. In return, the MNF agreed to cut off contact with other insurgent groups in the Northeast. Unfortunately, Laldenga did not live long to enjoy the fruits of his long struggle, as death cut short his stint as chief minister of the state and his life of what many believe was the “greatest Mizo” to have ever lived.

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Laldenga’s MNF had an armed wing called the Mizo National Army (MNA), which received arms, funding and training from both China and Pakistan. The MNA often launched militant attacks on the Indian armed forces and government establishments in Aizawl and Lunglei. The secessionist movement in the Mizo hills turned so grave that the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had resorted to air raids by the Indian Air Force (IAF) across key locations in the state. Till date, this remains the only instance of the IAF carrying out bombings within the country’s civilian territory.

But there were compelling reasons for it. There was limited Indian Army presence in the Mizo hills then. Rachit Seth, a scholar and a former Congress media coordinator, is right in pointing out that the nearest Army units in March 1966, were at least a day's drive away, and were sure to be blocked on the way, forcing Indira Gandhi to seek Indian Air force help.

Throughout the colonial period, the Northeast was treated separately and differently from other regions of British India. This history and legacy of separation and isolation from the rest of India created a problem when the time came to integrate different regions of the country after Independence.

Jawaharlal Nehru, a statesman and a visionary battling on many fronts, failed to respond sensitively to the intricate realities of the Northeast.

Laldenga’s resistance to the Indian state also captures the chequered story of the integration of the Northeast — Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura and Sikkim — with mainland India. It’s a tale littered with oversights and course corrections about a region now enclosed by Bangladesh, Bhutan, China (Tibet) and Myanmar, and whose only domestic, overland link with the rest of the country is a narrow corridor.

When Nehru set up the first States’ Reorganisation Commission, headed by Justice Fazal Ali, in 1956, 14 states were created on the basis of language. In the Northeast, however, only the Assam state was approved. The demands of minority groups for a Nagaland state to be created outside of Assam and for separation of Mizo areas from Assam were not met.

The Mizo peace accord initiated and implemented by Rajiv Gandhi not only ended years of violence and insurgency in Mizoram and, over the next two decades, the state would become the most peaceful in the country. It even overtook Kerala as the state with the highest literacy rate in India. The state’s first elections were held with the sitting Congress chief minister, Lal Thanhawla, stepping down to become the deputy chief minister. The MNF went on to win the Assembly elections in 1987 and Laldenga became the first chief minister of a full-fledged Mizoram state.

Lastly, it must be emphasised again that national interest continued to guide Indira Gandhi till she breathed last. In June 1984, she had ordered the storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar after getting reports that Bhindranwale led separatists had gathered sophisticated military weaponry inside and converted the holy temple into a fortress.

Outside, gangs of killers on motorcycles were shooting moderate Sikhs and innocent people. Indira Gandhi lost patience and summoned General Sundarji to evict Bhindranwale from the Golden Temple. On June 5, 1984, when Indian Army troops tried to advance, they met with a strong barrage of fire. An armoured car was knocked off by a rocket launcher.

(Views expressed in this opinion piece are that of the author.)