Apathy of the national media towards the region has generated a feeling of alienation. LAST year Mizoram along with four other north Indian states went for Assembly polls. The Mizo National Front (MNF) was voted back to power. The next day one of the leading dailies in Delhi ran a single column sider in its front page saying “MFN wins elections’’. The glaring folly, misspelling the name of the incumbent party, went unnoticed at least for the editors there, as no apologies were published later. Similarly, the last Assembly elections in Assam in 2001, which took place along with West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, saw election trends emerging in other states within few hours of the commencement of the counting process. It appeared an endless wait for the people to know exactly what was actually happening in Assam.

In this globalised world, the North-East seemed to far off from Delhi as far as communication was concerned. Not only the government policies, but also the apathy of the national media towards the region has generated among the people of North-East a deep-rooted feeling of alienation from the mainstream.

The rich cultural heritage of the region, its beautiful people and their historical importance, had found least space in national press. The national media has done very little to wipe out the notion of lack of concern for the people of NE, who face media isolation from time to time. A `well-informed’ Indian would be hard put to place each of these States on the map of India, or to say one line on what distinguishes Meghalaya from Manipur or Mizoram. Very few people know that the first elections based on universal adult franchise were held in Manipur, much before the Indian Constitution came into force. Or that Mizoram has the second highest literacy rates in the country and that Meghalaya is among the States that witness the highest electoral turnout in the country. And it is mostly because of wrong reasons — militant activities and killings — that the region gets covered in the national media. News about the high points of the NE people is blacked out. Naga rebellion is known to every Indian courtesy the national media. But how many of us know that how many Nagas laid down their lives during the Kargil conflict. The Lok Sabha elections are being held in the states of NE in a changed political context. In the last five years, all these small states have witnessed a change in the nature of the political competition leading to a shift in the established political alignments. There are several reasons why such a fundamental change is so little noticed outside these States. All these seven States (`The Seven Sisters’ minus Assam plus Sikkim) account for only 11 seats in the Lok Sabha that do not make much difference to the numbers game at the Centre, for the contest here does not principally involve the two major contenders in Delhi. Add to this the usual apathy and ignorance about the North-East and you begin to see why we know so little about the fundamental changes in the region. If the region does get some attention in the national media this time, it would be because the contest in these hill states may have implications for both the Congress and the BJP.

For the Congress, the NE is yet another instance of the decline and fall. The Congress’ presence in every State of the region was testimony to its national presence. In the 1989 Lok Sabha elections, an election Rajiv Gandhi lost badly, the Congress picked up as many as 10 out of the 11 seats barring Assam. It has been a downhill journey ever since, with the Congress down to 3 and 4 seats in the 1998 and the 1999 elections respectively. This time it may go down further, despite the fact that it is the ruling party in Meghalaya and Manipur. The numbers may not matter a great deal, but the symbolic  significance of    the loss of the NE hill States cannot be overestimated.

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