Mizo National Front
The Mizo National Front ( MNF ) is a regional party founded on September 22, 1961 in the Indian state of Mizoram .
History and causes
The mountainous region inhabited by the Mizo ( Lushai Hills during colonial times ) was first conquered by the British in 1850. Chief Mora († 1851), celebrated today as a popular hero, headed the resistance. In 1871/72 there was a second British expedition with over 8,000 men to “pacify” the region. Chief Sookpial († 1880) headed the mizo resistance. Only after the religiously inspired uprising of the brothers Lengpunga and Kholam (joint suicide in prison in September 1891) was put down, did the colonial rulers gain complete control.
The bamboo blossom ( mautam ), which recurs every 52 to 54 years , leads to a two-year famine in the area inhabited by the Mizo because of the strong spread of rodents. Therefore, when the occurrence was renewed in 1959 , the Mizoram Famine Front (MFF) was formed under the direction of the bank clerk Laldenga , who had been the head of the Mizo Cultural Society since 1955, and demanded support from the state government of Assam . After converting into the MNF, independence was demanded for the small tribe, but not taken seriously by the Indians until the armed uprising broke out.
Armed fight
Laldenga was arrested in 1965 for smuggling weapons from East Pakistan, but was soon released. On February 28, 1968 MNF-fighters stormed into the operation Jericho places Aizawl and Lungleh . It took the humiliated Indian army a week to take them back.
For the first time, air strikes were carried out against guerrillas. Tens of thousands of inhabitants of the Mizo villages (following the example of the Americans in Vietnam) were forcibly resettled from the mountains to guarded defensive villages from 1966, sometimes with only 24 hours' warning. This gave Laldenga's fighters further influx, his troops followed the strict code of conduct of Mao's partisans towards civilians, while the government reported massive rape and looting. Support was provided by China (until 1976) and Pakistan, which also provided training camps in East Pakistan until 1971.
Laldenga lived in exile in Dhaka until he and his men had to flee to West Pakistan from the advancing Indian troops in the 1971 Bangladesh war . The first peace feelers were conveyed from Kabul in November 1973 . The first negotiations took place in Frankfurt in 1975 and continued after his first return to India in January 1976. At the same time, the central government is trying to split the Mizo. Negotiations are broken off after the 1977 election of the Congress .
On January 22, 1982, the MNF was banned and 90 leading members were arrested. Laldenga was not arrested, but he was expelled from the country in April and went to London. After the assassination attempt on Indira Gandhi , the central government pursued a more conciliatory policy under her son. In 1986 a peace agreement was signed with Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi , which also provided for the formation of a separate federal state of Mizoram from the union territory that had existed since 1972 .
Political party
The now legal party with Laldenga at its head won the first elections in 1987 in Mizoram State, and Laldenga became Chief Minister . Accusations of corruption soon increased and he died in 1990. After years in the jungle, many fighters did not succeed in switching to a civilian life; they became depressed, addicted to alcohol or drugs.
The party leadership now took over Zoramthanga . In the elections to the state parliament (Mizoram Legislative Assembly) in 1998 the MNF won, which was able to repeat its victory in 2003. The right to vote brought her 132,505 votes (31.66%) 21 of the total of 40 seats. Zoramthanga served as Chief Minister for ten years. The party was temporarily a member of the National Democratic Alliance , but resigned in 2007. Deputy Chairman was Tawnluia in 2007 with Tlanghmingthanga as treasurer. The party suffered a devastating defeat in the 2008 elections and only won three seats in the regional parliament. In the all-India election in 2004 , the MNF was able to win one seat in Mizoram's parliament, and in the subsequent elections in 2009 and 2014 it was defeated by the candidates of the Congress party.
literature
- Sanjoy Hazarika: Strangers of the Mist: Tales of War and Peace from India's Northeast . New Delhi u. a. 1994
Individual evidence
- ↑ PR Kyndiah: Mizo Freedom Fighters . New Delhi 1994, ISBN 81-7203-025-8 , pp. 1-3.
- ↑ the territory then belonged to the federal state of Assam
- ↑ Developing A Framework to Understand and Develop Working Solutions to Major Conflicts .
- ^ Sanjoy Hazarika: Strangers of the Mist: Tales of War and Peace from India's Northeast . New Delhi u. a. 1994, pp. 112-118
- ↑ newslink.in