A generation that is paying attention

Imlisanen JamirThe advice that young Nagas should keep Jantar Mantar, Nepal and Bangladesh out of their thinking, devote themselves to knowledge and nation-building, give up joking about leaders and sit together across tribal lines came from a Minister who must have meant it kindly, and parts of it deserve agreement. Student bodies in Nagaland, however, have a long record of marching, issuing ultimatums and calling shutdowns over recruitment, over the Naga political issue and over much in between, and the state has tended to call that activism legitimate when it pointed somewhere convenient and a nuisance when it did not. Students may fairly wonder which of the two traditions is being commended.The uprisings set aside in that advice grew out of unemployment, patronage and administrations that answered to nobody, and a Naga graduate who has waited years for a government post, or watched a recruitment dispute pass from one court date to the next, will recognise those conditions without needing Kathmandu or Dhaka as a reference. Familiar ingredients make the comparison uncomfortable, and an official who would like it to stay distant might begin by asking what graduates actually wait for once the degree is in hand.Mockery of leaders looks different from the side of a generation with no seat on any committee and no invitation to any consultation, since a joke is often the cheapest way of showing that it is watching. A government confident in its record has little reason to fear a meme, and satire has long served as an early signal of discontent, which is useful to anyone in office who would prefer to hear about trouble before it reaches the road.The reminder that all are Nagas was warm, and it was delivered inside a political order where tribal hohos speak for their communities and where representation tends to follow tribal lines. Young people are therefore being asked to practise a unity their elders have yet to settle among themselves, and students who sit together across tribes will probably find the exercise easier than the leaders who negotiate across them.The counsel to highlight good work and flag problems needing action describes what most critical posts already attempt. A pothole photographed and shared, a salary months overdue and a project abandoned halfway all tend to reach the authorities through exactly this route, and whether a post counts as constructive or hostile usually depends on who is being criticised.Nation-building was the phrase that carried the speech, and in Nagaland the word nation is used in public life for the Indian state and also for the Naga people. The remarks leave open which of these was meant, and since students could take them either way, a call for common ground would gain from saying whose nation the young are being asked to build, and what they should do if the answer differs from the one they have grown up hearing.Comments can be sent to imlisanenjamir@gmail.com