Post-insurgency Rural Development Strategies in Mizoram: a Critical Analysis

Rural Development in Mizoram was severely slowed down and affected due to two decades of insurgency (1966-86) and grouping of villages as counter insurgency strategy. The grouping of villages has its permanent repercussions where post-grouping reconstruction measures were not initiated so as to suit the people and the area of the villages that grouped. Although various rural development initiatives were introduced and implemented during post-insurgency period, its impact on rural economy is minimal. The result is that approximately all villages and the State is not economically self-sufficient. The State still depends on almost all essential commodities from outside the state. The present paper focuses mainly on the impact of village grouping as counterinsurgency strategy and the post-independence rural development programmes initiated and its impact on rural Mizoram.