NORTH EAST CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY An interaction between GGPNL judges and Naga Scholars was jointly organized at North East Christian University (NECU) in collaboration with Kohima Education Society (KES) on the theme ‘‘Policy Making in North East India’ on 27th November 2021. The speakers for the session included Prof. Abu NS Ahmed (Director Research, Centre for Development and Peace Studies, Guwahati), Dr. Easterine Kire (noted writer and poet) and Dr. Vikas Kumar (Associate Professor of Economics, Azim Premji Univsersity, Bengaluru). The programme started with an invocation prayer by Rev. Dr. Yiepetso Wezah (Auxiliary Secretary, Bible society of India, Dimapur) and welcome speech by Prof. Darlando Khathing, honourable Vice-Chancellor (NECU). The first session commenced with the first speaker, Prof. Abu NS Abmed, speaking on ‘Look/Act East Policy with special emphasis on Surface Connectivity’, who stressed primarily on connectivity as a major factor to accelerate India’s Act East Policy. The speaker emphasized the importance on the shared prospect of maintaining surface connectivity between India and South-East and East Asian nations. The significance of North-Eastern States as the focal point of India’s Act East Policy was discussed in the session. Dr. Easterine Kire spoke on the theme, “Writing Historical Fiction (under the broad theme of Literature)”. She stated that writers of Historical Fiction drag human elements as the key point into their writing so that histories will be remembered. She further encouraged the audience to make the effort to learning one’s own ‘Naga history’ and to enthusiastically undertake the rediscovery of our Naga historical culture and tradition through oral interaction with elders stressing that the right time to write history for the younger generation is when we are young because we lose history as we grow. Sharing on the topic. “Data, Development and Democracy: A Triple Deficit in Nagaland”, Dr. Vikas Kumar underlined that Data, Development and Democracy are all inter-related. Flawed data can be used or manipulated due to lack of transparency and accountability and these hampers the democratic functioning by creating disparity of electoral seats thereby affecting our political and socio-economic interests. The speaker maintained that such mal-practices must be corrected at the earliest. The second session was an informal interaction between the speakers, scholars and the students followed by third session allowing scholars and students to share their learning from their interactive session.
