The warning issued by the Tangkhul Aze Katamnao Long, or Southern Tangkhul Students’ Union, that Naga villages along the Manipur-Myanmar border could eventually seek support from neighbouring countries, including China, should not be dismissed as mere rhetoric. At its press conference in Imphal, the union also said the Chief Minister should resign if he could not protect the people. The remarks came days after four Tangkhul civilians, including a father and son, were killed at Pilong in Kamjong district in an attack allegedly carried out by militants from across the international border. Police have identified suspected Kuki National Army-Burma cadres in the FIR.
A students’ organisation has neither the authority nor the machinery to invite a foreign power into the hills. Nor does its statement establish that any such approach has been made. What it does reveal is a growing anxiety among people living in a remote and exposed border belt. That anxiety deserves attention before it becomes something more consequential.
For decades, New Delhi’s Naga policy has rested heavily on negotiations with armed organisations. The ceasefire with the NSCN (IM) took effect in 1997, followed by the Framework Agreement of August 3, 2015. The Union government itself stated in 2017 that the Framework Agreement had laid down broad parameters but that a final accord had not been signed.
The difficulty is that a negotiating process with an insurgent leadership cannot substitute for security and political confidence among civilians living along the frontier. The people at Pilong are not participants in the negotiating table. They are the people who have to live with the consequences when armed men cross the border.
The September 24 attack has exposed that gap again. Four civilians were killed at a settlement near the international boundary, while another man reportedly escaped and alerted others. The Tangkhul Naga Long subsequently called for a shutdown in protest. The Chief Minister condemned the killings, and the government has indicated additional security deployment.
But condemnation after an attack cannot answer the central question confronting the border villages: how did armed men reach a vulnerable settlement and leave civilians dead?
The concern is not new. Cross-border insecurity has repeatedly complicated India’s northeastern security environment. The Union government has itself acknowledged that insurgent groups have historically used the India-Myanmar and Sino-Myanmar corridors for movement and arms procurement. In 2011, the Ministry of Home Affairs said it had inputs about northeastern insurgent leaders visiting China and about weapons being smuggled through the Sino-Myanmar border into the region.
History therefore makes the reference to China particularly sensitive. During the 1960s, Naga insurgents travelled through Myanmar to China for military training and returned with Chinese weapons. The movement generated serious internal divisions within the Naga insurgency. The episode demonstrated that when a border region becomes disconnected from the state, external actors can acquire strategic relevance without formally entering Indian territory.
That history should not be mechanically imposed on today’s situation. The geopolitical circumstances are different, the Naga political movement has changed, and the present-day allegations concerning China must be assessed on evidence rather than historical analogy.
Yet the security establishment itself has recently raised questions about a China-Myanmar-Naga connection. In a case concerning the Manipur conflict, the National Investigation Agency alleged that a China-Myanmar module of the NSCN (IM) had supported banned Meitei organisations. The allegation has been disputed by NSCN (IM), and it remains a matter for the courts to assess.
That is precisely why the government’s handling of the border matters. If civilians believe that armed groups can cross into their villages with impunity while the state arrives only after blood has been spilled, the resulting loss of confidence becomes a security problem in its own right.
The answer cannot be selective enforcement. Every armed organisation operating in and around Manipur must be judged against the same standard of law and civilian protection. Any ceasefire or Suspension of Operations arrangement must be assessed against whether it contributes to preventing attacks on civilians. Security deployment must also be coordinated so that vulnerable villages are not left exposed during transitions or withdrawals.
Border communities must be treated as partners in security, not merely as populations to be administered. Their concerns about fencing, movement, patrols and protection require direct engagement. The government must also explain, as far as operational security permits, what measures are being taken to prevent armed groups from crossing the international boundary.
The warning about China should therefore be read neither as an invitation nor as an established foreign intervention. It is a warning about the consequences of insecurity. New Delhi has spent decades trying to contain insurgency through negotiations, ceasefires and political engagement. That effort cannot be sustained if the civilians living in the shadow of the border lose faith in the state’s ability to protect them.
The immediate test is simple: identify who crossed into Pilong, establish how they crossed, prosecute those responsible, and ensure that the villages along the frontier are not left vulnerable again. The border communities are asking questions that cannot be answered at the negotiating table alone.