Traditional Institutions: The Gateway Towards Participatory Development
By I. ANUNGLA AIER

Starting from 1951, India has adopted planned development programs with special programs and allocation for tribal area development. The guiding principles of the nation’s policies with regard to tribal development were in consonance with the principle laid down by Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru in the famous Panchsheel:

Progression according to their own genius, change to be internally guided and executed through a simple administrative system honouring their traditional rights on land and forest, material advancement but as a means to improving the quality of life. 

However, various studies have shown that the development efforts of the government have not proceeded in the desired direction and that India’s tribes are plagued with numerous social, political and economic problems. According to B.D. Sharma, “national effort for development and modernization are giving rise to such torrential forces which the simple communities may not be able to stand. The basic questions are as to how the pace of change should be moderated and how the path of development should be guided.”1 Dube also notes that “[o]n a operational level it would be useful to examine why many development projects launched with great fanfare in tribal areas failed to yield the results they promised... focus will have to be on incompatibilities between innovation and culture, on communication gaps, on bureaucratic inadequacies and dysfunctions and on the soundness and unsoundness of the strategies of development planning and implementation.”2 With regard to tribal policies and issues, Bhupinder Singh also states that the “results of the efforts of the past decades have been lacklustre... the point is that we have experimented with the idea of planned development being an official program with the people in tow.”3

Such research-based observations points to what have gone wrong with development efforts. Ideas of development are imposed on the people that they are expected to accept and follow passively. Such practices have led to situations whereby, after the development fund is drained out, the people are left in no better position, if not worse. In this regard, the observation of Nongbri4 is worth mentioning. She states that “India’s draft Five-Year Plans on tribal Development loudly proclaimed Nehru’s policy of cultural pluralism and the preservation of tribal cultures and their distinctive identity. In reality, however, Nehru’s vision of a self-sufficient and functionally independent tribe existing against their pristine cultural backdrop remains a distant dream.”

Within these given situations one is likely to go with the concerns raised by Haimendorf:
Why do populations who for millennia persisted in a state of almost complete self-sufficiency, having developed their own way of life and cultural individuality without any need for outside assistance, have now to be protected and aided by government. This question appears to be all the more pertinent as only one or two generations ago many tribal communities enjoyed the advantages of a well-balanced ecology fully in tune with the natural resources of their environment and could boast an overall quality of life superior in many ways to that of large sections of the Indian rural population. Adequate food supplies, a non-exploitative social structure, freedom from indebtedness and other forms of dependence on non-tribal outsiders, equality of the sexes and a remarkable tolerance in all interpersonal relations were outstanding characteristics of such tribal societies.5

Probably the explanation can be found in what a former member of Planning Commission is reported to have stated: “Every Plan has the poetic part of the Chapter on objectives, approach and policy, often from the guiding principles of the Constitution. Having once gotten over this poetic preamble, the operational part got down to the serious business of ensuring the subversion of every one of them.”6
 
Development in India has been perceived as an instrument of political reconstruction.7 The task of economic development therefore is aimed not only to fully exploit its natural and human resources and attain a level of productivity that would give it a respectable position in the community of nations, but also to achieve political stability. Within this broad theme of national development, the strategy and policy approach to tribal development have been adopted. However, the plethora of studies on tribes generated in the recent times has not only highlighted the failure of development paradigms to address the social and cultural consequences but development itself has become an instrument of economic exploitation and cultural subjugation.

Progress and Social Development in Nagaland:

The contemporary political boundary of Nagaland as a state is a post-Independence phenomenon. More than three-fourths of the total population of the state consists of Nagas who are categorized as scheduled tribes under the Indian Constitution. The classical definitions of a “tribe” recognize “a politically and socially coherent and autonomous group occupying or claiming a particular territory.”8 Such definitions have emerged from the classic studies of tribes in Africa, where the tribe is defined as the largest group within which compensation is paid for and in which is manifested the machinery for reconciliations. However, such a definition of tribe(s) does not seem to have much applicability to the traditional Naga socio-political situation. For, the Nagas practiced head-hunting even within their own tribe and had no binding political organization, so to speak of, above the village level. For, each Naga village was a self-contained politically autonomous unit from whence the notion of “village-states” came into being. However, looking at the broader themes on which each of the villages were organized, we can also see that though the villages are autonomous in their functioning, they all are organized on, more or less, similar structural principles. The clusters of villages speaking the same language and ingrained in common culture were concretized as tribal entities during the colonial times and these solidified with the passage of time.

The process of change from a close-circuit tribal autonomy and isolated social system to a highly monetized economy and complex social system has resulted in distressing situations. The severity of the distress cannot be measured only in material or instrumental terms. More distressing are the cultural and social degradation. One of the glaring evidence of such social development is the increasing number of people who are disconnected, lacking in the skill and resources to earn a livelihood with self-respect, particularly among the young people. The culture of hard work, traditional exchange of services and competitiveness symbolized by the feasts of merit has become a thing of bygone days.

Given that development is directed at bringing about change in the conditions of existence, it would be disastrous to disregard the socio-cultural framework within which development is to take place. Additionally, if development is directed at a particular people, the question arises as to how can it be ensured that the course adopted is in harmony with the desired goal of that people? Development cannot be measured exclusively in material terms. Nor can the yardsticks used to measure the needs and expectations of a particular society be used to assess that of another society. These issues have not only an ethical but also practical bearing on the success of the development initiatives.

The state of Nagaland is no stranger to failed development projects. In fact, the failure of government development projects is the expected. Fully knowing that there will be no social audit, the officials and the political elite involved take advantage of the situation to aggrandize themselves while the public looks on helplessly – particularly the rural masses, with no mechanism to voice their frustrations. The trend of development in Nagaland is conspicuously marked by the practice of giving government subsidy to applicants without verifying the authenticity of the proposed beneficiaries. The methods, infrastructure, resources both human and natural and the workability of the projects are not studied. Moreover, development of necessary skills and capacity building is totally neglected. So much so, that the people are reduced to being dependent instead of being self-reliant. My experience in some Naga villages is that peoples’ perception of “projects” is associated with “subsidy” and their interests are roused fastest only when the magic word (subsidy) is used. Such a development is the outcome of doling out development funds for the sake of satisfying programme targets of beneficiaries without proper assessment and for political expediency.

As the main implementing agency, the success of the government development programs depends upon the sincerity and efficiency of the people who man the various organs of the bureaucracy. In reality, what we see in Nagaland is that the bureaucracy approaches the development issues as an easy way to amass wealth instead of finding ways to build up the society by making the people self-sufficient and self-reliant. Thus, the problems of the people have been multiplied manifold by an unresponsive and corrupt bureaucracy. In this process a close nexus between the bureaucracy, the politicians and the favoured opportunity seekers and beneficiaries is developed. Consequently, political interference is the rule rather than the exception in all spheres of development – be it in healthcare, education, infrastructural development, rural development, etc. Often, it is alleged that development programs suffers/fails because the people, being naïve and ignorant, are unable to absorb the benefits. Due to dearth of infrastructural facilities and the low-cost nature of their traditional economies, the development inputs earmarked may not be ingested, but we could hardly blame the people for these factors. Empirical evidence suggests that, more often than not, the failure lies squarely at the door of the implementing agencies. It is the latter’s failure, deliberate or otherwise, in upgrading the people’s social and cultural mechanisms that has sabotaged development objectives. The experience of the last few decades have shown a painful inadequacy of efforts in providing the needed skills and the opportunities for the communities to train, organize and design their development using local resources and knowledge.

The negation of development intervention by the bureaucracy have resulted in economic stagnation, deprivation and breakdown of traditional institutions and cultural ethos which, in turn, have given rise to a spate of armed conflicts and anti-social activities in Nagaland. Nagaland with a dominant tribal population is also the state with the longest history of political unrest in the country. With the purpose of dampening the political movement, the Government of India has funnelled huge funds for development purposes and projects. However, the ineffectual implementing agency, the bureaucracy, is not able to align the development projects to the traditional institutions or vice versa, thereby resulting in the increasing distancing of the decision makers from the people. Consequently, the government has had to turn towards politics to find solutions to their problems. In their search for internal stability, the use of ethnicity for political mobilization come easy to the Nagas, who see political power as a viable instrument to restore their self-esteem.

In the light of the prevailing social and economic conditions in Nagaland, a new approach to development is called for. What is urgently needed is the participatory approach, not just in policy terms but also at the practical implementation level. So far, the practice has been to impose programs upon the people with complete disregard of what they actually need. This has proved to be ineffective. What we need to do is to give greater focus on exploring the resources within our own cultural system that can help define and generate development in our own terms.

Anthropological insights have shown that a people when detached from their cultural moorings tend to show signs of detachment, apathy, and gradual detribalization of the society. With regard to development of tribal communities in particular, anthropological writings have always suggested the need to work from within their cultural system. It has always been the long-standing position of anthropology that tribal development should be in tune with the cultural ethos, and not contrary. Development of a society should be effected by the strengthening of their traditional institutions, respect for the cultural ethos, building up of traditional knowledge system, etc. which all can identify themselves with by creating conditions that boosts their self-confidence and high moral. This can be achieved only when the people are given the opportunity of developing the security of knowing their self-worth. The example of Japan as one of the wealthiest nation of the world is witness to this act of developing the society based on the solid rock of their traditional culture. The development practices in Nagaland, however, have seen a complete neglect of such anthropological insight.

Traditional Institutions: A Development Option in Nagaland:

The Naga society is a traditional society in the sense that despite all the various show of modernity by way of a formal state order and organized socio-political and economic pursuits, the basic core of the society on which rests the frame of reference for self-identification and interpersonal relationships lies with the traditional mode of reckoning. Sufficient evidence, both in the written and oral forms, exists which prove that, traditionally, the tribal Naga societies were self-sufficient and self-contained. Sadly, the situation today tells a different story. Naga people, whether in the urban or rural areas, are no longer self-sufficient. This makes one wonder how many starvation deaths will occur if New Delhi stops the flow of fund into the state treasury. Though there has been much hype about grass-root level development, the truth is that the plan policies and programs designed by planners who have the least knowledge of local needs are simply imposed upon the people. At the implementation level also, a mechanical process of carrying out the program is followed without exploring local solutions and local knowledge systems for solving the development problems.

The consequences of the present development trends have amply illustrated that we, as a people, cannot afford to remain silent spectators to the scene that is unfolding before us nor must we be just passive “development targets.” We need to take stock of our social and cultural assets and develop or revive such assets to evolve an indigenous mechanism for the optimum utilization of the resources to become self-reliant. In this context, the revival of some of the abandoned traditional institutions and the strengthening of the existing ones can be explored as a viable option or mechanism for the development of the people.

As evidenced by the various descriptive accounts and monographs, the traditional society presents structural variations in their social and political organization. However, a general theme based on egalitarian principle is operative in all the Naga communities. The Naga society is made up of cross-cutting ties; and the individual and the household are integrated into the society by being life members of larger functional units such as the lineage, clan, age group, Morung, and khels. The individual’s life cycle and the routine of daily life are expressed through the inter-play of these social groups in operations.9 In anthropological parlance, such social groups are termed as social institutions, where the various cultural complexes are woven together in relation to the basic interests of social living within which the individual’s place and role as a productive member of the society are defined and invested with meaning in their life-world.

Such institutions signify the status and roles of a person within a social system. It is therefore of utmost importance not to upset the social balance. However, what has occurred in the Naga community is that though the basic institutions such as the lineage, clan and the Khel that serves as individual source of identification are undisturbed, the secondary institutions such as the Morung and the Tsuki (girls’ dormitory) that serves social purposes have become obsolete. So also the vivacity of the age groups has seemingly declined due to changing priorities. However, given the right incentives, such traditional institutions can be revived back to serve modern purposes.

It is understood that the Morung or the Tsuki in its pristine form is not possible nor will it fit the present needs. However, what we can visualize is an institution that can serve as a meting point of the tradition and modern requirements. Without going into the ethnographic details that varies from tribe to tribe, it is stated that, traditionally, membership and affiliations to such institutions follows certain cultural norms. So also do the internal structure and governance of the institutions. The revival of such institutions based on the relevant cultural norms will provide a frame with which the old can identify themselves and the young can establish a link with their history and ancestors.

For meeting development purposes, while playing the role of preserving the cultural heritage of keeping the traditions alive, it can boost the tourism industry whereby every Naga village can become a tourist destination. Through such an initiative, they can generate their own resources and provide opportunities to become self-reliant. Traditionally, such institutions were a training centre for imparting knowledge. Even today, it can still serve the same purpose as a link for training of skills and for imparting knowledge for various trades and new technologies. This can also be a base for promoting the dying indigenous arts and crafts motivating the development of small-scale industries using indigenous materials and local expertise.

As the Morung as well as the Tsuki is linked to the age group system, the revival of the former can automatically strengthen the latter. Though, people are still organized according to age groups and every individual identifies with one’s group, its area of activity is only nominal. However, given the opportunity and the necessary assistance, such social groups have the capacity to develop programs of their own design for meeting their needs.
From the implementation point of view, working through such organized groups will presumably make their tasks easier than working with individuals. From the social perspective, the revival of such traditional institutions will channelise the productive energy of the people and restore the vivacity of Naga way of life. Such initiatives have the potential of providing alternative means of self-employment, and create conditions within the village which can arrest the migration of the rural population to urban areas.

Towards Participatory Approach:

Most anthropological critiques of development projects criticize planning which is insensitive to the cultural and social complexity of local conditions and thus the diverse effects of externally induced change.10 In Nagaland, too, we are witnessing a replay of such insensitive development planning and inadequacy of the developing agencies in implementing various programs. The social development of dependency, apathy and the impoverishment of the community witnessed in Nagaland is a consequence of the lack of anthropological insight in development planning and implementation. This paper thus proposes a departure from the current practice and puts emphasis on the need of reviving and incorporating the traditional institutions [and values] as a way of damage control. Emphasis also needs to be refocused on the participatory approach right from the stage of planning/ designing the projects to the implementation level in practical terms.

For achieving the development goals, it is important that the people develops a sense of belonging and involvement in the process; not just as a lucky beneficiary of some programs. Development of the society does not work that way in a state like Nagaland and the northeast.