The proscribed Hynniewtrep National Liberation Council (HNLC) has maintained a firm stand that the peace process may resume only if the Centre and State governments withdraw all cases and grant general amnesty to the top leaders and cadres of the outfit.
After formally submitting the HNLC’s letter of withdrawing itself from the peace process to state government’s interlocutor PS Dkhar, the outfit’s representative and president of the Hynniewtrep National Youth Front (HNYF) Sadon K Blah said, “If the government withdraw the cases, if government grants general amnesty, there is every possibility that the peace process will continue because the offer was made by the HNLC initially, so there is every possibility that the peace process will continue but if the government is insisting on the natural death of law, which is not possible, this peace process is over.”
To a question, Blah said the government is insisting on the legal approach while the HNLC is insisting on the political approach. “Therefore, the ball is with the government now,” he added.
He continued: “There are two perspectives here. The agenda is whether the government should solve this problem by applying the law or whether this government should solve this problem by addressing it politically. If they say that the HNLC let them come and let the law take its own course, that is a legal approach to the warring faction, which I feel is not a correct approach. Applying a legal approach to the warring faction, I think it is a wrong approach. All wars in this world that have happened have not been solved by the law, it has been solved by political discussion.
So if the government says that the ball is in the court of the HNLC, that is a legal approach that the government has applied but if the HNLC says that the ball is in the government’s court, the HNLC is insisting on the political approach the government need to adopt.”
The HNYF leader further asserted the need for the government to have a political will to apply the same yardstick to the HNLC as was done for NGOs during the 2013 ILP agitations.
“Myself also I was implicated in a series of cases during ILP agitations. Through discussion with Mukul Sangma, who at that time was chief minister, all cases were dropped instantly except three murder cases which we were able to get acquitted from the court of law. So if that yardstick can be applied to the agitating NGOs, then why not apply the same to the HNLC, it is only a political will, it is not really that necessary to stick by the law,” he said.
Stating that most cases against the HNLC leaders and cadres are related to bomb blasts, Blah said, “I remember AK Mishra (MHA Advisor (NE) during discussion on the request to drop cases, had said that none of the crimes of the HNLC are heinous in nature. So if crimes are not heinous in nature then the government should consider dropping and withdrawing all charges put against the leaders and cadres.”
Blah also denied that there is any division in the HNLC and said, “They (HNLC) are unanimous in whatever decision is taken. All letters that were forwarded to me in the previous years, while the peace process was going on, were signed by both the chairman and the general secretary.”
According to him, there has been no change in the demands of the outfit.
Meanwhile, Blah said that the HNYF strongly condemned the MDA government for failing to bring this peace process to its logical conclusion.
“We also feel that the government has everything in its hand to withdraw the cases, to grant amnesty to all cadres of the HNLC, including those who are in jails, because if peace is to happen, the government must apply political solution not a legal solution to this issue,” he stated.
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