Expanding horizontal comradeship in the politics of Northeast

Written by Alankar Kaushik

The relationship of media technology with the 'public' has driven 20th century debates on modernity. The public has been evoked through a variety of terms – the spectator, the audience, the viewer, and the observer. And being an observer in the digital medium, I don't know which aspect of politics, should I trust as a citizen.

Like any inexpensive digital gadget user of the 21st century, I also followed the microblogging sites of the politicians during the recently held political campaign of the Meghalaya Legislative Assembly elections. During the heat of the campaign, it was categorically mentioned that Meghalaya is the most corrupt state in the country. And cut to the swearing-in ceremony of the Chief Minister of the same state, you have seen the presence of the Prime Minister, along with the important cabinet minister on the podium of the same corrupt state.

I agree and appreciate the fact that the gesture displayed by the Prime Minister in visiting the Northeastern region during this important occasion is praiseworthy and very encouraging to the people of the Northeast. No other Prime minister ever thought and attempted to visit the Northeast the number of times as the current PM did. But the question arises as to why this part of the region has become so important for Delhi.

Why and how the supposedly ‘unimaginable communities’ of the Northeastern region became a part of the deep horizontal comradeship. The formulation ‘unimaginable communities’ is an obvious reference to Benedict Anderson’s influential work of Imagined Communities. For our readers, according to Anderson, the nation must be understood as an imagined community ‘because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion.’

Unlike the imagined communities of print capitalism that Anderson defines as being finite, limited and bounded, the unimaginable communities of the digital age are mostly limitless and unbounded in the worldwide flows of national, transnational, and trans-local networks. The electronic flow of the big screens of television and the new media networks are unimaginable both in a literal sense of being at the technological limits of imaginative access and a figurative sense of becoming limitless in imaginary excess.

The content that is created in this electronic network produces communities both in a sacred sense of communion and a secular sense of communication where through the everyday transmissions, it attains the meaningful status of images only in an intimate encounter with the diverse imaginations of viewers at home.

Considering the earlier unimaginable communities of Northeast India, through the digital space and the content flowing through these fluid spaces made people to meet each other virtually. Therefore, the impact of electronic capitalism on the user’s sense of space and place is more dynamic and therefore more difficult to imagine than the conventional formulations of nationality and community in print capitalism as assigned by Anderson.

The electronic mobility produced by the communication networks enables users to be a part of the secular community of nationalism, or the divine communion of religious traditions, even as it opens the possibilities for transgressing the arbitrary boundaries that a nation-state must enforce to protect its transcendental authority.

Therefore, through digital networks, the communities of Northeast India are being brought to the core of the nation-building process by the present government. With the coming of the 2024 general elections, this gesture of the Prime minister also will garner an image of oneness and shall fill the gaps in the electoral deficit, if any in 2024.

In 2015, celebrated journalist  Rajdeep Sardesai tweeted, “If 'tyranny of distance' means sadly limited coverage of north-East, 'doorstep journalism' means max coverage of Delhi”. The tyranny of distance was famously cited by TV journalist Rajdeep Sardesai citing why the so-called mainstream media has not covered protests and other news events in the Northeast or the South of the country while every small protest in Delhi gets its prominent coverage. 

The growth of multiple regional media houses in Northeast India has helped to connect diverse social groups in a network of dialogues and negotiations and contribute to the democratic sphere. The local voices, therefore, are beginning to challenge the dominant discourse of participation hegemonized by the English-speaking middle class.

The moot point is the issue of ‘connectivity’ with the north-eastern region of India, which pretends to end the isolation using digital networks and thereby eclipsing the inherent complexities that exist in the region.  Today, the issue of the northeastern region being neglected is not just one of alienation. But it goes beyond that. It involves the exercise of the Constitutional right of the indigenous communities to be accepted on equal grounds and this kind of acceptance can only generate a healthy democracy in the Indian polity.

Hence, to reach the masses using local languages and by using ubiquitous communication networks are making people realise that ‘you are close to Delhi.’ Is this something close to real?

The development of the Northeastern region is a game changer for the ruling party. And in the name of development, Northeast has come to the centre stage of national attention during the recently held elections also. The outcome of elections in the Northeast bears a symbiotic relationship with the political dynamics at the Centre.

The ruling party at the centre always starts with an edge over these smaller remotely located states given their economic, infrastructural, and developmental dependence. The communities of the northeastern region which are not equally important before have become significantly important considering the available natural resources and business opportunities that can create huge employment avenues for the unemployed and skilled youth of the region. Though as a citizen, I always distrust an institution given the precedence in the region and considering its backwardness since the independence, yet with the presence of the biggest personalities of the country in the region, I can only posit that everything is fair in war and politics.

As Union Law Minister  Kiren Rijiju points out that Northeast elections cannot be just treated as small regional elections anymore, it is true to the fact that even the 24x7 National television networks started their broadcast right from 7 am in the morning. This proves that though there are only five Lok Sabha MPs from the three states of Nagaland, Tripura, and Meghalaya, the Northeast accounts for 25 Lok Sabha seats in 2024. Hence, the conversion of an unimaginable community to a community where they can dream and imagine ‘oneness’ in the presence of a ‘vishwas for vikas’ (trust for development) is a top priority.

The writer is a faculty at the department of journalism and mass communication, EFL University, Regional Campus, Shillong.