Decoding the Current Landscape of India’s Northeast

So how did the region change so much?

Becoming a part of India

On December 15, 1971, the Indian Parliament passed The North-Eastern Areas (Reorganisation) Act, a day before the formal conclusion of the Bangladesh War. This resulted in a significant remapping of Assam and India with the establishment of Meghalaya, Manipur, and Tripura as states, while Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh were made into union territories (they were granted full statehood in 1987). This restructuring was part of a broader regional remapping process closely tied to India's conflict with Pakistan in 1971 and the subsequent emergence of Bangladesh from what was then called East Pakistan.

The borders that resulted from this Act within Northeast India, both internal and external, have long posed persistent challenges for successive governments. Initially drawn as administrative demarcations by the British Raj, these lines primarily distinguished regions under British rule from those that were nominally independent. Over time, these British-administered areas evolved into districts, and their borders eventually defined the boundaries of union territories, states, and even countries.

For instance, at the time of Independence, Sikkim became an independent country before being annexed by India in 1975.

A conflict-ridden process

According to H Srikanth, professor of political science at North-Eastern Hill University (NEHU), “The British viewed the Northeastern frontier as a buffer between India and China. They were not keen on demarcating borders between British India and Burma, as Burma was also part of British India. There was no change even when Burma was separated from India in 1935. They were more focused on the external border because of military or strategic reasons. They no doubt imposed direct colonial administration in the valleys of Northeast which yielded considerable revenue, but they showed little interest in the hill areas which were variously classified as partly excluded, fully excluded, and unadministered areas.”

This meant that, in 1947 upon Independence, India inherited a region that had until then been governed largely as a frontier tract —quite literally, as Arunachal was called the North-East Frontier Tract— instead of an integral part. Furthermore, certain areas within the region operated with significant autonomy and were unfamiliar with the concept of internal boundaries.

Administrators and the Indian media often lament the ‘porous’ nature of these borders. They miss the fact that these lines which arbitrarily divide communities and families were never meant to be hard borders. The populations and landscapes on either side of these borders tend to be the same at most places.

The key role of security concerns in the integration process

Following 1947, approximately 98 per cent of the region's borders transformed into international boundaries, linking it with countries like China, Myanmar, Bangladesh, and Bhutan. The only physical link it maintained with the rest of India was a narrow land corridor in Siliguri, spanning roughly 22 kilometres and often nicknamed the "chicken's neck."

“By the 1960s, national security concerns were further heightened,” writes Sanjib Baruah, professor of political studies at Bard College in New York. “India lost a border war with China in 1962, with the Chinese entering all the way into Assam, and the movement for Naga independence was in full swing. India and Pakistan fought a war in 1965, and the Mizo rebellion began the following year. Fears about the challenge to national security if the country’s external and domestic enemies were to join hands, became jarringly immediate.

“That the state of Nagaland was created a year after the China War is no accident. By making Nagaland into a state, Indian officials hoped to create Naga stakeholders in the Indian dispensation that would help quell the Angami Zapu Phizo-led rebellion. In retrospect, it turned out to be the first step toward replacing the administrative structure of the frontier province with a new structure of governance.”

Prioritising convenience over people

Northeast is a construct that is a result of administrative convenience. The drawing of the boundaries in the region was unlike the process of most other Indian states which were the result of language-based movements. Consequently, the region has witnessed long-drawn conflicts, the oldest being the Naga conflict.

“Land is a very emotive issue in the Northeast. Various sides have gradually encroached on more and more territory and this leads to frequent flare-ups of long-running disputes,” says Pushpita Das, a Research Fellow and Coordinator of the Internal Security Centre at think tank MP-IDSA.

Centre’s attitude towards the Northeast

Baruah’s analysis of how the Northeast is viewed by those in the central parts is succinct and accurate, “When using a directional name, it is perhaps always a good idea to ask, “Where is it we really start from, where is the place that enunciates this itinerary”? For “the Northeast”, the point of reference is clear: it is the Indian “heartland”. The directional place name highlights the peculiar hierarchical relation that has developed between this region and the nation since Independence.

“There is perhaps no better evidence of the region’s othering than the normalisation of the racialized category Northeasterner. While the term is hardly ever used for self-identification (one rarely hears someone say ‘I am a Northeasterner’ rather than ‘I am a Naga/Khasi/Meitei/Kuki’), it nonetheless has found its way into common speak, especially outside the region.”

Even the development discourse in the region has been exploitative because it treated the region as merely a means to serve the greater good of developing the nation. Policies like ‘Look East, Act East,’ big dams, are all aimed at fulfilling this very ambition.