Kohima, Oct. 31: With the eight-year talks between the Centre and the NSCN (I-M) moving at a snail’s pace, the Naga outfit has launched an exercise to take its “two nation” theory to the people.

The exercise began even as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh proposed to hear out views about integration of Naga-inhabited areas from the Meiteis and Nagas in New Delhi next month.

The NSCN (I-M) leaders have been propagating the theory that India and Nagalim are “two nations,” though inseparable, but this is the first time the outfit is reaching out to the Naga people for their support on the issue.

The first public meeting was held in Kohima on Saturday where the outfit’s deputy kilo kilonser (home minister) V. Horam made a case for the theory.

The audience comprised village elders and village council chairmen from the Northern Angami area, which, significantly, is a stronghold of the Federal Government of Nagaland or the Naga National Council (Adinno). Taking a dig at the rival rebel group, Horam alleged that the rights of the Nagas were lost because the NNC signed the Shillong Accord in November, 1975.

Horam said the solution to the Naga problem could lie in the creation of two nations but with strong mutual bonds. “Some will think why not sever ties totally, but having a relation with India is good for us,” he said in Nagamese. “It is a time for the Nagas to take a decision,” he added.

It was on October 9 in Bangkok that the Delhi and the NSCN faction had first spoken of a federal relationship in detail.

Horam, the main speaker at the meeting in Kohima village panchayat hall, explained to the elders at length the current status of the peace talks. The rebel leader claimed that it had been agreed that “Indians and Nagas” were different entities and that a solution has to be “out of the box that is the Indian Constitution”.

Some of the major questions in the public mind here, and hitherto discussed behind closed doors during talks, were discussed openly for the first time since the consultative meeting at the outfit’s Hebron camp last December.

On the issue of currency, Horam said that Nagas could have their own currency but it would be prudent to use a common currency as India has the requisite gold reserves.

“Look at Myanmar where people have to pay 10,000 kyats to buy a shirt or a pair of trousers,” he said.