Northeast India: Beyond the Stereotypes
By H. Khogen Singh

Books on Northeast India, like those on Kashmir, come out by the dozen these days. The authors generally belong to two categories. In the first are former bureaucrats, policemen and generals. Most of them do not belong to the region but have served there for long. In the second are academics, mostly from the region. The divide in the prescriptions for the ethnic insurgency in the region is clear to any discernible observer. For the former, economic development, employment generation and a corruption-free administration are the mantras for tackling the insurgencies. For the second group, the solution lies in going beyond the development paradigm.

But now a well-known author and thinker from the Northeast has come up with suggestions that go beyond the stereotypes. His views are influenced to a large extent by what is happening globally. Baruah points out that in official publications and much of the academic writing in India, the problems of the North-east are often explained by underdevelopment and poor integration into the pan-Indian mainstream. Consequently, the measures that are put forth to tackle the region's numerous insurgencies are broadly two: economic development and nation building. Baruah calls for 'imagining a different future' for the Northeast by arguing that a 'continued faith in the failed narratives of national development and nation building can be quite dangerous in the present global conjuncture.'

The author says that a lesson could be learnt from the European Union's Committee of the Regions that was set up under the Maastrich Treaty of 1993. The Treaty allows 'regional identities' in the EU to pursue a transnational politics of recognition that has been able to compensate for their marginalization within nation-states. These regional identities in the EU, according to Baruah, are not unlike the ethnic assertions in Northeast that are behind the various insurgencies in the region.

Baruah says it is necessary to know the region's history for a better understanding of its contemporary problems. But unfortunately, 'the bureaucrats, politicians and military officers who make northeast policy are either oblivious of the historical issues that insurgencies raise, or consider them too trivial to merit substantive engagement.'

The book will be a disappointment for the uninitiated as it is not a historical account of the region, particularly its post-independence troubled time. Its analytical and insightful arguments make it a must-read for researchers and those in the government who shape northeast policy. It is certainly among the best books on the Northeast to come out in recent years.