Spl. Correspondent
Government of India’s representative for Naga peace talks, AK Mishra is likely to hold another round of talks with the Naga Political Groups (NPGs) in Nagaland soon.
Highly-placed sources informed Nagaland Post that Mishra is expected to arrive later this month to hold deliberations with the Naga groups. However, no date has been fixed for the meeting.
Talks were expected to resume soon after the culmination on Manipur Assembly elections, sources added. The second and the final phase of Manipur Assembly poll ended on Saturday
The development also holds significance as the State government has convened a consultative meeting with all stakeholders and elected representatives on March 9 to deliberate on the Naga peace process, among other issues. With Nagaland Assembly elections scheduled early next year, there has been an urgency to resolve the vexed Naga political issue at the earliest.
This was the very reason why all the legislators had decided to form an opposition-less government under the banner of United Democratic Alliance (UDA).
UDA chairman and former chief minister, TR Zeliang had recently said that the UDA government was ready to give one “last push” for solution to the Naga imbroglio before next Christmas 2022.
Of late, chief minister Neiphiu Rio had been emphasising in his public speeches that the Centre was willing to give more seats in Parliament and in the State Assembly to resolve the decades-old Naga political issue.
He said the Central government and Naga nationalist groups were willing to give more seats to Nagaland in both Houses of Parliament and the State assembly.
It may also be recalled that then BJP national general secretary and in-charge of North East Ram Madhav, while drawing attention to the chorus of demands for “Solution Before Election” in 2018, had said that holding elections when due was a constitutional obligation and unavoidable and therefore opined that the slogan in Nagaland should be “Election For Solution” to help bring solution closer.
Explaining what he meant by “Election For Solution”, Ram Madhav had said when an agreement was arrived at between the Central government and various Naga groups, it had to be implemented in Nagaland, which could be done effectively only under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.