Will his defiance of Delhi win the day for Mizoram chief minister Zoramthanga?

An upholder of “Mizo nationalism” and a leader unafraid to take on a powerful Centre for the Mizo cause – Mizoram chief minister Zoramthanga goes into the state Assembly elections on November 7 banking on his credentials as a leader of his community.

At a recent event to induct new members to his party, the Mizo National Front, 79-year-old Zoramthanga said, “The Centre, the neighbouring states and countries, the world know who we are.”

He was speaking of his government’s steadfast refusal to bend to the Centre’s directives to shut the door on Kuki-Chin refugees fleeing the violence in neighbouring Myanmar since 2021, despite being an ally of the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Mizos share a strong ethnic bond with Manipur’s Kuki and Myanmar’s Chin tribes, considered to be an integral part of a larger brotherhood of tribes spread across Myanmar, India and Bangladesh.

Mizoram now hosts over 50,000 displaced people from the larger Kuki-Chin-Zo community. A few weeks ahead of the announcement of the Mizoram Assembly polls, Zoramthanga decided against collecting biometric data of Myanmar refugees in the state – against the explicit directions of the Centre.

“If a state government, not baptised with Mizo nationalism, was in power, they might push back our brothers and sisters...

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